


A Happier Christmas in Godric's Hollow

by ap_aelfwine



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Almost a Narnia crossover, Anglo-Catholicism, Christmas, Collars and Cuddling, F/F, F/M, Marriage, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-08-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 09:14:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 48,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3376049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ap_aelfwine/pseuds/ap_aelfwine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry and Hermione go to church on Christmas Eve. Hermione encounters Aslan. She's not certain if she's having a religious experience or if it's only her subconscious talking, but what He says makes all the sense in the universe.<br/>Meanwhile, Father Christmas rescues Luna from Malfoy Manor, collects Ginny from the Burrow, and takes them to Godric's Hollow to re-unite them with their friends. Fortunately for his sense of morality, Susan Bones' uncle (married to Millicent Bulstrode's cousin), the vicar of St. Godric's, is more than happy to say a quick wedding.<br/>It seems there are more pleasurable ways of ending a Dark Lord's reign of terror than wandering the country over collecting Horcruces, and far better Weasleys to have as company in doing the job.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A conversation, a rescue, a home-leaving, and a wedding.

**Author's Note:**

> The characters and situations of the Harry Potter series are copyright J.K. Rowling. They may not be used or reproduced commercially without permission. The use of these characters and situations is not to be construed as challenge to said copyright. They are merely borrowed for this work of non-commercial fanfiction, from which the author derives no financial benefit.  
> ***  
> Poly warning, het warning, femslash warning, Christmas warning, yours truly warning.  
> ***  
> I started this on Christmas Day, thinking it was going to be a nice little fic (12-24,000 words) which I'd post on Twelfth Night. It's currently at over fifty thousand words.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pretty much what the title says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have another chapter of this written, for a total of more than fifty thousand words. I'm only posting two chapters to begin with because I think I'll write the fourth chapter more effectively if I have it mostly done before I post the third one and get comments about what's coming next. Thank you!

Hermione Granger felt a sudden sharp pang of homesickness when the bells rang from the tower of Saint Godric's, and a flood of childhood memories rushed through her mind. _No,_ she thought to herself, _we're in Godric's Hollow on a mission._ _However much you might miss_ _Midnight Mass,_ _you have no business taking the time to go to a Christmas_ _Eve_ _service in a village church,_ _because the fate of Wizarding_ _Britain, and possibly the rest of the world as well,_ _is riding on your shoulders and Harry's. It's not as if you're a believer, and even if you were, you could be excused for putting the necessities of a just war ahead of your devotions._

“Hermione?”

She turned to him. “Yes, Harry?”

“Do you want to go in?” He gestured towards the church. The doors were open and the parishioners were making their way inside.

“We shouldn't... we have a mission, Harry.”

“Didn't you tell me your family always went to church on Christmas Eve, even your father? We can spare an hour or two.”

“Are you sure, Harry?”

“It's the least you deserve, Hermione. You're my best friend, and you've done so very much for me. I only wish there were more I could do to make it a happy Christmas for you.”

She wanted to kiss him. _No. You're only his best_ friend. _You're_ _practically one of the lads_ _to him_ _, or at least_ _his_ _sister. You'll only lose him, just the way you lost Ron. You can live with losing Ron,_ _that's why you_ _decided to go_ _for him and not for the_ _green-eyed_ _boy who's been giving you damp knickers ever since_ _the night_ _he dragged his best mate out of the Great Hall and rescued you from a troll_ _. Losing Harry would kill you. And probably him as well and considering he's our only hope against V_ _ol—the Dark Lord_ _, that would mean death and destruction and slavery for thousands, if not millions._ _Don't be selfish, Hermione_ _._ “I wouldn't want to force you, Harry.”

“You wouldn't be forcing me at all. I, I'd love to go. The Dursleys always left me in the cupboard when they went to church at Christmas and Easter, but I've been curious ever since I heard Dudley whinging about how boring it all was. And besides, if my family come from Godric's Hollow and my parents are buried in the churchyard here, that might mean that they went to the church here. Maybe they even came here at Christmas?”

“Oh, Harry.” She hugged him. That was safe. They could hug, and it only meant they were friends. They'd been hugging ever since First Year, and it was clear that Harry had learnt to like it. “Thank you.”

“Thank you, Hermione.” When they disengaged from the embrace, he offered her his arm, and she took it. Any observer might have thought them a couple who'd been married for some years.

Inside, Saint Godric's Church was warm, with dark wood pews and plastered walls. The organ was playing, and a small choir were singing “O Come All Ye Faithful.” It wasn't as thorough-going Anglo-Catholic as Saint Dunstan's, the parish where Hermione's family had always gone for Midnight Mass, but it was comfortable and inviting. They found seats in one of the back pews. Surprising herself, Hermione knelt, made the Sign of the Cross, and bowed her head. _Lord, if_ _Y_ _ou're there,_ _and if_ _Y_ _ou_ _even_ _care_ _,_ _please_ _watch over my Harry._

“Always, Daughter of Eve. I know each sparrow that falls and rises. Do you truly think that you and your Son of Adam are worth less than they?” The voice was rich, deep, soft as velvet. She'd heard it before, but she couldn't think where. She opened her eyes and raised her head, and found herself looking into the warm amber eyes of a great shaggy-maned lion who had somehow managed to fit himself, facing backwards, into the pew in front of her, which had been empty moments earlier.

“Aslan? You're real?”

“Clive did well to write those books, child. Under any name you call Me by, I am. And as Aslan any number have opened their hearts to Me who were raised to associate other names of Mine with superstition and witchcraft. Or, for that matter, with witch-burnings.”

“Which is perfectly silly, because witch-burning was overwhelmingly done by the secular authorities. Even I know that much... oh, sorry.”

The lion chuckled. “Not at all, Daughter of Eve. Thank you.”

She glanced over at Harry. He was still, frighteningly still, but there was a gentle smile on his face. He'd knelt beside her, which made her feel warm even as she feared.

“He's perfectly fine, My dear Hermione. You're outside time, right now, for as long as we need to have this conversation.”

“Why? Why would You come and talk to me now? Why didn't You come to me when Daddy was saying You were nothing but a lie the priests had made up so the warlords would give them a good living in exchange for justifying their society to itself? Or when Mummy said we couldn't know for certain and she herself liked to think there was some kind of a creative spirit that put everything in motion, but it probably wasn't a person we could even remotely understand or who cared for us as individuals to any great extent?”

“I was there in your heart, My dear, which is why you doubted what your parents said very nearly as much as you doubted Me. As Augustine said, I'm deeper in you than you are in yourself. Belief is a product of free will, and I'd be nothing more than a puppet master if I didn't allow you the choice not to believe. Even when this is done, you'll be able to dismiss our conversation as an hallucination based on stress, if you should choose to do. But as to why I'm here talking with you, it's for the same reason as I spoke to the Pevensies in those books you loved, and still love. You've a job to do, child, you and your fine young man, and the way you're going about it is leading you astray. If you keep on the path you've laid out in your mind, you might defeat your Dark Lord, but you'll ruin yourself and your dearest loves.”

“Oh? Well, I don't see how we could do it any better, with everything going to Hell all about us and Ron gone and... sorry.”

“Don't be, child. You've a right to your anger and your fear. You've been led astray, through no fault of your own, because poor well-meaning Albus Dumbledore had a great concern for mercy and forgiveness, but went about them in entirely the wrong way.”

“Well, then why didn't You talk to _him_?”

“I did, as surely as I'm talking to you. But he always managed to put it aside, or to twist it round to suit his own ideas. Remember what I said about free will? Some of the most sincere and faithful believers on Earth, alas, have heard My still small voice and convinced themselves I was telling them to do whatever was the worst possible thing they could have done at the time, whether it was murder and torture or marrying someone they didn't love, breaking their own heart and leaving the person they truly did love to suffer and mourn without them. Would you believe that?”

_Is he saying what I think? No,_ _tha_ _t_ _'s_ _nothing but_ _my wishful thinking,_ _even if the rest of this_ is _more_ _._ “I'm not even sure I believe I'm really talking to You, Aslan, but I can certainly believe that people who aren't horrible by nature can do horrible things. Or should I call You Aslan? This isn't Narnia, as much as I might wish it were.”

“If that's the name that works for you, child, of course you may use it.”

“So, Aslan, what should I do? Or does Your regard for my free will not allow You to say it?”

“You should follow your heart, child. Do what you know to be true, not what you think you should do.”

“That's rich. My heart—or maybe You'd say it's only my groin?—wants all sorts of things that Your church would call a sin, my father would call an evolutionary dead end and a fit of self indulgence, and my mother would call a betrayal of women's rights. I would have thought anything all three agreed about was on the same level as the Law of Gravitation.”

The lion smiled, ever so gently. “Ginevra, Luna, and Harry?”

“Err... yes.” _How did He know? Don't be silly, Hermione._ _Either H_ _e's a projection of your subconscious or else He really is the_ _K_ _ing of king_ _s_ _,_ _L_ _ord of lords, etcetera, talking to you in the form of a lion from one of your favourite childhood stories. Either way, He'd know_ _about_ _all_ _your silly fantasies_ _._

“Some branches of the Church, I fear, indeed might err and call that love a sin, but others might call it kind and faithful and true, even holy. You never spoke with a Wizarding priest, of course.”

“You know I didn't. I walked past Saint Aidan's in Hogsmeade a dozen times, but I never felt it was right for me to go in when I wouldn't have done at home. It seemed rude. The clergy were there to counsel and comfort believers, after all, not to waste their time talking with an agnostic Muggleborn possessed of an incurable case of sociological curiosity.”

“The right priest would have been able to see the lines between you and your beloved ones and, having seen, would have offered to say your wedding Mass as soon as it became appropriate. Even a magical priest without that sight would be willing to counsel you and guide the four of you towards marriage.”

“Really?”

“You might have a word with the vicar here—he's an old Ravenclaw and finished Hogwarts in the year your Harry's parents started. But first thing after the Mass, the two of you should go and walk out in the market square. I have other friends and servants than your species alone, you know. You might find some help there. And should you think you see Bathilda Bagshot walking about, don't follow. Her soul's in My country now, and what's got her body is nothing good.”

She leant forward and hugged Him. The coarse soft hairs of His mane were shockingly real, as was the warmth. “Aslan... Thank You. I... even if You're only a hallucination born of stress and lack of sleep or something my subconscious conjured up to make me feel better, I love You.”

He nuzzled her shoulder. “I love you as well, Hermione. Go in peace, go in wisdom, go in love, and go in safety with your handsome young Son of Adam. And your sweet friends, also.”

 

#

 

Luna Lovegood was not having a happy Christmas Eve. In some ways, it was even worse than the Christmas after her mother died, when her father realised he didn't know the spell to roast the goose with and broke down crying when he tried to look it up.

That said, the cellars of Malfoy Manor weren't as cold and damp as they could have been, and three days ago when Peter Pettigrew tried to bother her Lady Narcissa Malfoy had come storming down from above to hex the rat-man's bits off, a condition which she said would last for the next twelve hours. She'd told Luna she was sorry a man had threatened her with assault beneath the roof of her own house, and laid a geas on Pettigrew that would make his organs of generation disappear permanently if he ever tried it again. _I think_ _there was more_ _she wanted to say_ _to me_ _, but couldn't. In_ _a_ _way, she might be_ _nearly_ _as much a prisoner_ _here_ _as I am,_ _even if she can order that unpleasant little man around so long as she's not stopping him doing something the Dark Lord actually told him to do_ _._

The Malfoy House Elves were as kind as they were able to be within the orders they were given, and tonight they'd even brought Luna and Mister Ollivander a bit of pudding with their dinner. But still, she was lonely and sad and she was worried for her friends, for handsome brave Harry and his brilliant beautiful Hermione and darling bright Ginevra, for loyal Neville and his sweet Hufflepuffs Hannah and Susan, and even for Ronald and his silly Lavender Brown.

“She does mean well, and so does he, in his desperately Wrackspurt-infected way. Oh, I do hope they've not been hurt,” she whispered aloud. Across the room, Mister Ollivander mumbled something in his sleep and turned over on his pallet. She hoped she'd not awakened him, because she knew he was very short on sleep. The Dark Lord had been questioning him again this afternoon, which always seemed to give him nightmares.

At that very moment, a shape appeared on the darkened wall beside her. Luna watched with a sense of mild curiosity as it resolved itself into a fireplace, which although it didn't have a fire in the grate was none the less lit with its own soft glow. _Is this an hallucination? How interesting! I've always wondered what it would be like to have one of those._ She was certain she'd never had an hallucination before, in spite of how often other people insisted that the Wrackspurts and Nargles and all the other creatures she could see and hear which they couldn't perceive at all must be hallucinations, at least if she wasn't making them up completely. People could be silly that way, especially Ravenclaws, which was a characteristic Luna would never ever have imagined would be so commonplace in the House of the Wise before she came to Hogwarts.

As she watched, a portly man in red robes with white fur trim came out of the fireplace, almost as if he were using the Floo, but obviously he wasn't because even if it had been a real fireplace it surely wouldn't have been hooked up to the Floo and even if it had been hooked up to the Floo there wasn't any fire in the grate to make a connection with the network.

Luna laid her fingertip against her lips. “Please don't wake Mister Ollivander, sir,” she said in a low voice that was even softer and less likely to carry than an ordinary whisper. “He's a very elderly gentleman, and he needs his rest. I'm afraid he's been having trouble sleeping lately, and I don't think he wants to meet even the most interesting hallucination. I hope you don't mind.”

“Never fear, my dear, never fear. My sort of magic can do things that your witchcraft and wizardry can't even begin to accomplish, and no human being under this roof but yourself will even know I'm here.”

“Are you sure, Mister...?”

“You can call me Father Christmas, my dear. That's as good a name for me as any. And I'm very sure. I've worked at this trade most all of my life, and I have to tell you that from my perspective Mister Ollivander is scarce more than a babe in arms. In fact, it seems hardly any time ago that he got his first set of carving tools.”

_Oh. I suppose he's not an hallucination, after all. Well, I've never met Father Christmas,_ _at least not the genuine article,_ _so I suppose this_ _will be_ _just as interesting and novel an experience for me._ “I'm very pleased and honoured to meet you, Father Christmas. Thank you so much for coming round to visit, but I'm afraid I really can't think of anything I need in the way of presents. I seem to be a prisoner here at the moment and there isn't space to fly a broomstick in. The light isn't nearly good enough for reading books, and I doubt Mister Ollivander wants to listen to music, so giving me a flute or a cittern wouldn't be helpful. And I do have to confess I'm not sure I'd find a teddy particularly comforting, but if you've got a spare blanket you might give it to Mister Ollivander, please, as I think he could use another. Oh, and I'm terribly sorry I can't offer you milk and biscuits, or any other refreshment.”

“That's all right, my dear Miss Lovegood. Thank you for thinking of me, but I'll be fine without a snack. And as it happens, I've come here to collect you. I'm not usually in the rescuing business, but Someone I can't very well refuse asked me to stop by Malfoy Manor. It's high time you were out of this hole in the ground.”

“Could you not take Mister Ollivander instead? I understand that he seems young to you, but by our human standards he is very old. He's rather frail, not to mention he's a kind gentleman and a brilliant wand-maker, most worthy indeed. I'm sure he deserves to be rescued far more than I do.”

The portly man chuckled. “I'm charmed by your thoughtfulness, my dear girl, and very pleased and impressed by your selflessness. If I were in need of a successor, I'd seriously consider asking you to take up my position. But I'm afraid my Boss was most insistent that only you, Luna Myfanwy Xenophilia Eibhlín Lovegood, would do. A pair of very dear friends of yours need you, and I'm meant to convey you to meet them this evening.”

“Your Boss? I'll have to remember to say a special 'thank you' in my prayers, won't I?”

“That would be appropriate, Miss Lovegood.”

Under other circumstances, Luna might have spent a great deal of time speculating as to whether this meant Father Christmas was a member of the angelic hierarchy, or if he was a daemon, like the jinn or the fairy folk, made of a different substance to mankind and gifted with different powers but possessed of the same free will to choose good or evil. If he were a daemon, he must be a sort of daemon mystic or even a saint, since she was given to understand they didn't typically get such explicit and specific marching orders from the Most High any more than the vast majority of humans ever did, but it stood to reason that there would be such people amongst daemons as well. She'd have to look into what others might have written of their own meetings with Father Christmas, wouldn't she? It could make a lovely article for the _Quibbler._ But as it was she had other, more pressing things to think of.

_A pair of dear friends? He must mean Harry and Hermione!_ Luna felt warm inside for the first time since she'd been taken captive on Platform Nine and Three Quarters. And rather tingly as well. “You mean... I'm meant as their Christmas gift? Hurray! Thank you so much, Father Christmas! This is the very best present I've ever had, and I promise I'll do everything in my power to be the very best Christmas present they've ever had.”

All of a sudden he got a wary look on his face, as if she'd handed him a bowl of those peculiar sherbet lemons that Professor Dumbledore, God rest him, had always offered round and which nobody, not even Luna, had ever wanted to try. _That's rather nice, actually._ _I think h_ _e must understand me. Usually folk_ _will_ _simply_ _be_ _confused._ “I suppose I do have to admit you could put it that way if you wanted to, Miss Lovegood.”

“Oh, good! Ever since I was little, I've wished and prayed and dreamt that someday I'd be given as a Christmas gift! Especially to Harry and Hermione, they're so delightful and pretty and sweet. I've been hoping ever since I met them that they'd finally see what everyone else does and post the banns so I could give myself to them as a wedding present, because I don't think I'm boasting when I say I'd look awfully nice in a silver collar with my hands tied up in white silk ribbon and a little card of ivory-coloured paper with a message congratulating them on their nuptials written in my best copperplate hand suspended from my collar and resting right between my breasts. But this is even better! Oh, I do hope they'll rub my belly and scratch behind my ears and brush my hair. And maybe they'll sit me in a tub of warm water and give me a bath? That would be ever so lovely!”

“Err, Miss Lovegood...” His face was getting redder. His cheeks had been slightly flushed when he appeared, no doubt from the cold outside, but now he was beginning to glow. For his sake, Luna was glad it was a shade that didn't clash with his clothes.

“Do you have a collar for me to wear, Father Christmas, or will Harry and Hermione need to buy one? Only I'm given to understand they're on the run these days, and I don't know if they'll be able to nip into the pet shop, if there even is one wherever they are right now, and say 'We've just been given this cute little blonde girl, and we need a collar and a leash for her, since we've not had any time to train her to heel and play fetch and come when she's called and it would be irresponsible to let her run loose.' Then again, you might know their current situation better than I, mightn't you?”

Father Christmas shook his head. “You're their beloved friend, Miss Lovegood. They need you, and you need them. I'm not bringing you as a gift. For Heaven's sake, I don't give kittens or puppies or ponies, much less young girls. I'm a personification of seasonable charity and affectionate giving, not a matchmaker for people with a taste for pet-play! And you're certainly not a doll or a teddy, Miss Lovegood. I'm rescuing you and bringing you to them so that all of you can help each other to do what needs done.”

“Very well, Father Christmas. You can bring me to them as simply their friend, and you needn't worry about telling them I'm really their pet. I'll explain it myself once you've left to go about the rest of your business. They'd probably prefer we had some privacy when they see me unclothed for the first time, now that I think about it. They're both rather charmingly shy.” Luna had hoped that Father Christmas would understand, but he seemed to have much the same problem as Daddy, who always comprehended far more than other people did, right up until the point when it became suddenly crystal clear that he had a strange mental block that prevented him seeing something that to Luna was as obvious as the nose on somebody else's face.

_They_ _really are_ _very alike, aren't they?_ _Daddy_ _has never understood_ _why_ _I_ _should_ _be given_ _as a gift to Harry, either,_ _not any of the times I tried to explain it to him,_ _starting_ _when I was six and I tried to owl-post myself_ _._ _And he was so put out_ _that_ _day_ _in the summer before First Year_ _when I_ _sat_ _myself in the window at Magical Menagerie,_ _right between those cute little Kneazle_ _kitten_ _s and that darling Crup,_ _with a sign_ _hung on a_ _string_ _round my neck_ _saying I was for sale exclusively to Harry Potter,_ _no others need apply,_ _for the bargain price of_ _twenty-eight_ _Knut_ _s_ _. I still don't know why_ _it bothered him._ _I_ _even_ _kept my_ _clothes_ _on, despite_ _how strange it_ _must have looked_ _when_ _none of the other pets were wearing anything at all, because I remembered him_ _telling_ _me boys were_ _shy,_ _delicate, and sensitive and Harry would be intimidated if he met me and I were nude._

“Thank you, Miss Lovegood. So, shall we be on our way?”

“I suppose we had better. Will I climb into your bag? It does look very comfortable.”

“No, Miss Lovegood. The bag is for carrying toys, not people. I don't usually provide passenger service, but on the rare occasions when I do they've always ridden in the sleigh beside me.”

“Are you sure? I should think I would make an awfully nice toy, although I will admit I'm prejudiced and in any case I suppose I'm not the person whose opinion matters. In any case, I do hope they'll both play with me.”

“Yes, Miss Lovegood, I am sure.”

“Really? I promise I'll keep my clothes on, even if it's very warm inside. I know that pets don't normally wear them, but you do rather remind me of my Daddy and I wouldn't want to embarrass you. Harry and Hermione can undress me and put my collar on me once you've left.”

Father Christmas rolled his eyes and didn't say anything. Instead, he reached into his bag and brought out a blanket, which floated across the room and laid itself over the sleeping wand-maker, and a tray of covered dishes, complete with a little flask of wine, which went beside the man's pallet. A pair of small flat boxes followed them. “There's a few things to comfort and cheer your Mister Ollivander when he wakes. Nobody other than he himself will notice them. I suppose the Dark Lord's men will find you gone tomorrow morning, but how you escaped will be a complete mystery to them. I imagine Pettigrew will get the blame. That would please me, were I capable of vindictiveness, since he's been a very bad little rat and a worse boy. So, shall we go?”

“We shall. Although I do think that if you can carry covered dishes of food in your bag without anything spilling or going astray, you ought to be just as well able to carry me in there.”

“I'm not going to argue any more with you, Miss Lovegood. I'm afraid you might win, and then what would I do? Take my hand, and I'll bring you up to the sleigh. We've still got to collect your friend Miss Weasley before we can go to Godric's Hollow and meet your Mister Potter and your Miss Granger.”

“You mean to tell me that darling Ginevra and I will be pet sisters? Thank you so very much from the bottom of my heart, Father Christmas! I didn't think anyone could say anything that would make the prospect of being Harry and Hermione's pet any more amazing than it already was, but you just did. Let's go!”

He sighed, and pulled a cloak and a pair of boots out of his bag. “Here, I reckon you'll want these. It's cold out there. For Heaven's sake, I almost forgot to give them you. Congratulations, Miss Lovegood, I've not been this confused in... actually, I don't think I've ever been this confused.”

“I'm not sure if I should thank you or if I should apologise to you, Father Christmas.” Luna put the cloak on. It was delightfully soft and very warm, and as much as she preferred to go about in as little clothing as her circumstances permitted she was grateful for it. The boots were lined with fur, as warm and soft as the cloak. There was no need for socks with boots like this, which made her happy because she didn't particularly like wearing socks, and the fit was perfect. They were almost as comfortable as being barefoot, which was nice because there were times in the winter when even Luna found it too cold to go barefoot outside.

“Oh, well, please don't trouble your mind on my account, my dear. You're a brilliant young witch and one of the most unusual people I've ever met, which is saying something. I'm happy to be getting you out of here. But I do hope you'll not be offended when I say that I'll be grateful to drop you and Miss Weasley off with your friends and get back to my normal occupation?”

“Not at all, Father Christmas. Thank you very much for the cloak and boots.”

“You're most welcome, Miss Lovegood. It's my pleasure. Now take a good grip on my arm, and off we'll go.” Luna did, and he laid his fingertip up alongside his nose. _Interesting. Perhaps that_ _rather strange_ _American_ _who wrote the famous poem_ _—what was his name? Clement something, I think—really did see the_ _man himself_ _, after all. I'll have to tell Daddy._ _There might be an article just in that, even if Harry and Hermione and Ginevra will hopefully be keeping me too busy to write it for some while._

Instantly, they were standing on the flat mansard-style roof of Malfoy Manor. It didn't feel like they'd come by Floo or flown up a chimney, which was probably just as well because Luna imagined going up a chimney would be even sootier than taking the Floo through a hearth that hadn't been cleaned in six months. For that matter, it didn't feel like side-along Apparation or a trip by Portkey. “Thank you, Father Christmas. That was a novel and interesting experience. And do you think House Elves might travel in something like the same fashion? I've seen them popping from place to place. Well, I suppose they themselves might call it something else, but they've never told me their name for it and it's always looked like 'popping' to me. 'Jumping' is too confusing, 'jaunting' just doesn't sound right, and 'teleportation' is a rather awkward word, not to mention that most Wizards wouldn't be able to pronounce it, which might be important were I writing an article, since words they can't pronounce seem to throw them off. Just try writing a piece about electricity for a Wizarding publication, even one with as open-minded a readership as Daddy's _Quibbler_ has got, and you'll see what I mean.”

He laughed. “You're a very clever young girl indeed, my dear Miss Lovegood. And if you'll get in the sleigh, please? It's time we headed for Devon.”

It really was drawn by reindeer. The leader had an ordinary black nose, which Luna thought might disappoint some people, but it did make sense to her. _A glowing_ _red_ _nose wouldn't help_ _very_ _much_ _at all_ _in the fog, except possibly to prevent other sleighs from hitting this one, and I doubt there are many other reindeer-drawn sleighs in the sky. Not tonight, at any rate._ _It would be_ _terribly_ _bad manners on the part of the_ _other_ _drivers._

Rather than spend more time thinking, she climbed up into the sleigh. Father Christmas deposited his bag behind the seat and got up beside her. As soon as he picked up the reins, they were in the air. “Vertical take off and landing! How very delightfully practical! I always did wonder how you'd find sufficient space for a take off or landing run on the average roof.”

He chuckled, but the rest of his response was lost in the rushing of the wind. Which was fine, because Luna was too busy enjoying the landscape as it passed below them to carry on a conversation, even with someone as unusual as Father Christmas.

 

#

 

Ginny Weasley had gone up to bed early, even though she knew she only was going to put on her night gown, slide under her duvet, and lie wide awake in the dark for hours. It was Christmas Eve, but she was having trouble feeling even remotely festive. Nearly everyone in the Burrow was probably much the same, she knew, but she couldn't help thinking it was hardest for her.

_Ron, of course, seems to be doing just fine,_ she thought, and her lips drew back from her teeth in a snarl. Her brother had run out on Harry and Hermione. Nobody had said anything, but she 'd known within minutes of walking into the kitchen and finding him at the table. If he'd simply come round for a visit whilst his two best friends were occupied with some task that didn't need his assistance he would have brought news of them. No, the going had got tough, and her brother had got going straight home to a warm bed and Mum's cooking . A couple of days ago, she'd got tired of waiting for him to say something about his friends and asked how they were. Ron told her Harry had got so moody he was useless and Hermione was a traitor who should have come along with him, since he was her boyfriend in everything but name. _I hope the git really does come down with Spattergroit._

“Oh, how I wish _I_ were the older one,” she whispered. She'd never have turned her back on Harry and Hermione, not when the Goblet of Fire spat out Harry's name, not when they were out fighting to bring down the Dark Lord, not even when they finally saw what everyone else had seen for years and became boyfriend and girlfriend, not ever. _If only I weren't their so-called best friend's little sister. If only_ I _were their best friend, and Ron were simply_ my _annoying little brother. I'd always be beside them, and I'd never ever come between them._

_At least not in the bad way, I wouldn't, because I certainly wouldn't mind being the filling in a Harry-Ginny-Hermione sandwich. Or having Harry sandwiched between Hermione and me. For that matter, holding Hermione as Harry makes love to her, tracing gentle patterns with my fingers on her breasts and belly, kissing the back of her neck and telling her she's the most gorgeous Mistress ever to walk the Earth, sounds heavenly. Especially if Luna were there in the bed with us, watching with a bright smile on her face, ready to join in or simply taking a break and enjoying the sight and sound of our pleasure. And when we were all satisfied, we'd cuddle together, skin to skin, and sleep safe and warm..._

There, that was something she could feel. It was comforting to know she could still be aroused, even though it didn't take away the empty hollow feeling in her chest, the terrible fear she felt for Harry and Hermione and for Luna, who'd been taken captive before she could make it home to the Rook from Platform Nine and Three Quarters. Percy had come to collect Ginny that day, even though he wasn't really speaking to his family. He'd seized her arm as soon as she stepped off the Express and hustled her up the platform to the Apparation point with such vigour that if he hadn't been her brother she would have drawn her wand on him.

Brother or not, she'd considered it, but there were too many Aurors about, some of the vicious dregs who'd remained with the department rather than going to ground after fierce old Rufus Scrimgeour died standing in shattered armour amidst the blasted wreckage of the Ministry atrium with his sword bloody from point to pommel and his burnt-out wand fused to his hand by the force of his final curse, a generous side party of black-robed white-masked vermin—Rabastan Lestrange, the elder Goyle, and Marcus Flint amongst them—lying at his feet. A squad of the people they called Snatchers had been there as well, shifty-looking thugs who'd become something like auxiliary Aurors since the Ministry fell and everything went wrong. She'd not liked her chances, and she'd thought it better to go with himfor the moment, reckoning there was bound to be a better opportunity for escape once they wereaway from the station.

Percy had Apparated her directly to the doorstep of the Burrow, so she hadn't drawn her wand and cast a _Reducto_ into his gut or a cutting curse up under his chin as she'd been prepared to do if he tried to hand her over to some Ministry superior who'd offered him a promotion in exchange for his pretty young sister. _I should have done, even though he did take me home. He_ knew, _the dirty bastard._

Ever since the next morning, when she'd called over to the Lovegood home only to find Mister Lovegood in the garden weeping into his half-empty quart tankard of neat gin and Luna nowhere to be seen, Ginny had wished she'd resisted Percy and stayed by the Express. If she had broken away from her traitor of a brother, she could have stood back to back against the enemy with her dearest childhood friend. Luna was the first person she'd ever kissed, back when they were simply curious children who wondered what this kissing thing actually felt like, the girl she'd snuggled and whispered secrets with for the best part of her life, ever since that bright lovely day in their seventh summer when Luna and her parents came back to Ottery St. Catchpole from Africa to take up residence in the Lovegood tower after old Mister and Mrs Lovegood, Luna's great grandparents, moved to Tenerife in the Canary Islands where another branch of their family lived amongst a colony of expatriate selkies.

Maybe they could have battled their way free and run off to find Harry and Hermione, to take up the duty Ron had abandoned and give them all the support they needed. Even if life on the run meant they'd all be too busy with the fight against the Dark Lord to take comfort in each others' arms, they would have been together. And even if she and her friend had failed to win their fight on the platform, at least she would have shared Luna's fate. Azkaban would be better than waiting for word that never came.

Ginny pulled her mind away from the towering wall of fear and bleak depression, and plunged herself back into the daydream of a better world, one where none of her brothers were traitors and the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters were a thing of the past, defeated for good in Harry's infancy just as everyone had said when she was little. It was only fantasy, she knew, but fantasy was all she had left.

It would be a world where Harry hadn't been left with his vicious Muggle relatives. Instead, her favourite boy would have grown up in a happy home with full knowledge of both magic and his own history. In that world, he and Hermione would have been betrothed according to the old customs in their First Year, sharing a room and a bed in Gryffindor Tower, growing up side by side into the future Lord and Lady of the Most Ancient and Most Noble House of Potter. They would have married just as soon as they could legally hold the ceremony, and Ginny and Luna would have kissed both of them outside the church, wishing them a pleasant wedding night and making them colour so very prettily. After the reception, the two girls would have cuddled together in one bed and whispered back and forth about the many exciting things Harry and Hermione would be doing in their own bed until they fell asleep.

In that world, she and Luna would have celebrated Ginny's birthday by putting on simple dresses of thin cloth, secured only by a single knot and with nothing at all underneath, and going to greet their dearest friends.

 

_We'd knock at the door of their elegant suite, and Harry would let us in. “Good morning and a very happy birthday, Ginny,” he'd say. “And good morning to you as well, Luna. You're certainly up early.”_

“ _May I ask if your Lady Hermione is awake, my Lord?”_

“ _You... you needn't call me that, Ginny. There's no need for rank or ceremony between friends.”_

“ _Oh, but she likes calling you that, my Lord Harry,” Luna would say. And then Hermione would come out of their bedchamber, still wearing her dressing gown. And she'd smile, and I'd know that she understood what Luna and I had planned and it was all going to be fine._

“ _Harry, my love, let's greet our sweet friends... properly,” she'd say, taking his arm. And Luna and I would reach up as one and untie the knots that held our dresses in place. They'd fall to the ground, and we'd stand completely nude and unashamed before our Master and Mistress. We'd give them a minute to look us over, and then we'd kneel at their feet and hold up our wands in both hands, offering them our magic along with our bodies._

“ _Master, Mistress,” Luna would say, “Ginevra has reached the age of consent today. And as you know, I've been of age since some few months ago. We've been talking about this for years, and we know what we want. We're yours completely, mind, body, and soul, with all the magic at our command, now and forever. If you'll have us, that is, and we hope you will.”_

“ _My pet sister Luna and I promise to faithfully serve you now and always, Lord and Lady Potter. I hope we please you.”_

_Harry and Hermione would look at each other, smiling. And Hermione would reach in the pocket of her dressing gown and bring out two delicate silver collars, each with a little ring for a leash. “How fortunate,” she'd say, “because Harry and I did get you a very special birthday gift, sweet Ginny. We got you one as well, darling Luna, and I do hope you don't mind that we've waited until today to give it you?”_

“ _Of course not, my dear Mistress. I know you're far too kind to collar me and leave poor Ginevra all alone until her birthday.”_

 

Ginny felt a thrilling wave of desire run through her body. This was what she needed, a happy fantasy to keep herself going until she found a way to actually help her friends and a bit of physical pleasure to relax her so she could sleep tonight. She reached for the buttons of her nightgown, teasing herself through the cloth with her other hand just as Harry or Hermione might have done, assuming that they'd allowed their pet Ginny to keep her garment for a minute or two instead of stripping her naked bare as soon as they were alone together.

At just that moment, the shallow old-fashioned coal fireplace in the wall opposite her bed, which she had never actually used because modern warming charms were enough to keep the room comfortable and in any case Mum would never have allowed her to bring coal upstairs, expanded into a great hearth, bigger even than the one in the kitchen, more than big enough that a portly white-bearded man in red clothes trimmed with white fur could step out of it. The man had a great bag like a pedlar's pack slung over his shoulder, and someone Ginny could scarcely credit was there in her room clung to his other arm, wrapped up in a cloak with the clothes she'd worn on the Express beneath it and a pair of sturdy leather boots on her feet.

“Happy Christmas Eve, Ginevra!”

“Luna!” Ginny sprang out of bed. She hadn't any thought for whether her family might hear her shout or the sound of her feet on the floor. She hadn't any thought for the sheer absurdity of Luna appearing in her room on Father Christmas' arm through a miniature fireplace that wasn't connected to the Floo and had probably last been used for heat when her grandparents were revising for O.W.L.S. and looking forward to their next Saturday in Hogsmeade. She hadn't even any thought for the embarrassment of being caught touching herself under the covers with her nightgown partially unbuttoned.

She and Luna met in the middle of the floor, their arms tight about each other, holding each other close and whispering affectionate nonsense in each others' ears. “I'm so sorry, Luna. I wish I'd known. I'd never have let Percy drag me away. I'd have fought beside you as I should have done. I've been so afraid I'd never see you again. So afraid I'd never hug you again. So afraid we'd all die without seeing Harry and Hermione again. And I was so sorry I'd not even kissed you on the cheek before we left the compartment.”

“It's all right, Ginevra. I'm here now. You're here. We're safe.”

“Oh, Luna, I almost can't believe that you're real. I almost can't believe I'm not dreaming.”

“I don't think you're dreaming, Ginevra. If you are, of course, we're both dreaming together. But I don't think we are, because if we were dreaming I reckon Harry and Hermione would be here instead of Father Christmas and neither of us would be wearing anything beyond a collar. And if it were a very very good dream, that would make us the most dressed-up people in the room.”

“Oh, Luna!” Ginny kissed her friend's cheek. It was warm, soft, real. And Luna's lips against her own cheek were just as real. They nuzzled each others' cheeks for a moment more, and then they were lip to lip, kissing. It felt even better than it had when they were young and they'd pretended they were simply practising kissing with a trusted friend so they'd know what they were doing when the boys finally grew up enough to be interested in kissing them.

Father Christmas coughed, and Ginny realised she was nibbling on her friend's bottom lip, and her fingers were tangled in Luna's lovely blonde ringlets. “Err, sorry.”

“Please don't be sorry, Ginevra. It feels delightful. But I do suppose we're embarrassing Father Christmas. He reminds me of Daddy, in more ways than just his title. And of your dad as well in a way, now that I think of it. But he says he's going to bring us to Harry and Hermione as their Christmas present, so I'm sure we'll have plenty of time to kiss each other and both of them once he's left us and gone on his way.”

“Oh my goodness! Harry and Hermione? Are they okay? I know my stupid rat of a brother ran off and left them to fight the Dark Lord by themselves, but I've not heard any news and I've been very nearly as worried for them as I've been for you, my sweet friend Luna.”

“Your friends are fine, Miss Weasley. My understanding is that they've been going about things in the wrong way, but I'm certain that once they have the two of you to support them matters will go much better.”

Ginny squeezed Luna to her one more time, and then let go. “Well, then, let's be on our way. Are we travelling by sleigh, I presume?”

“You might want to put on a more suitable outfit, Miss Weasley. I assure you we can spare the time.” Father Christmas was blushing, and his eyes were fixed on a point above Ginny's head. After a moment, she realised that her nightgown was open down almost to her navel _._ She blushed as well, and hastily pulled the garment closed.

“He's right, Ginevra. As much as I generally would dislike the idea of covering up your beautiful body, in this weather it does make a great deal of sense.”

“Good point. Would you please be so kind as to turn around whilst I change, Father Christmas?”

“Gladly, Miss Weasley.” It was hard not to giggle at the relief in the man's voice. Ginny pressed a little kiss on Luna's cheek and set about readying herself for travel. Luna whistled when she took her nightgown off, which might have seemed slightly excessive even for Luna, but it made Ginny's heart rise to know her friend felt so cheerful in spite of her recent imprisonment.

Within minutes, she'd dressed in jeans and one of the woollen jumpers her mother made, plaited her hair, and picked up her school bag, which she'd packed with clothes and useful things, as well as a few mementos, so she'd have it ready to grab and bring with her if she had to leave in a hurry, whether it should be to join Harry and Hermione, to rescue Luna, to escape from an attack on her family, or to avoid an attempt by one of her two faithless brothers to force her into compliance with the new Tom Riddle-worshipping order of things that had taken over in Wizarding Britain.

“I suppose you haven't got any spare clothes with you, Luna, but we're close enough to the same size, and you're welcome to take whatever you'd like from my wardrobe before we go. For that matter, you can share in what I've got in my bag as well, but it isn't much and we might be better off to each have a change or two of clothes. I've a little travelling case right there that should do nicely for you, I think.”

“Oh, wonderful, it's the bag you used to bring when you came over to stay at the Rook! Thank you so much, Ginevra. As much as I like not wearing anything at all, and as much as I hope Harry and Hermione will choose to keep us unclothed when we're alone together, I do suppose I could use something else to wear for now. I've had this dress on ever since we left Hogwarts, which is a long time, now that I think about it.” Luna stripped off and began to look through Ginny's clothes. She was a touch thinner than she had been, but Ginny was glad she couldn't see any obvious injuries.

She was horribly tempted to hug Luna again, just to feel her warmth and softness and to prove to herself that her friend was really here, but she knew better. Luna was always happy for a hug, no matter how she was dressed, but Father Christmas would know Ginny was hugging a naked girl and he'd be mortified even though he wasn't looking. “I'm sorry we've not got time for you to have a bath, dearest sweet Looney.”

“Oh, that's fine, my dearest Ginevra. I'm sure we'll have a chance once we've settled in with Harry and Hermione. You'll be very welcome to scrub my back, and I hope you'll permit me to do your own.” Despite her general preference for skirts and going regimental, Luna put on knickers and a pair of jeans. She slipped her feet back into her boots and reached for a cotton blouse and a woolly jumper.

_We've got co-ordinated outfits_ _on_ _! Maybe now I'm starting to understand why some girls will do that._ _And maybe I'm also starting to wonder about Lavender and Parvati?_ “I'd be happy to. And I'm sorry my regular bras won't fit you properly, love. If you'd like, you could see if one of the Quidditch ones might do. They're in the other drawer.”

“Oh, that's all right, darling. You know these little half-lemons of mine are just fine without anything to keep them in place. Look, love, no jiggle!” Luna shimmied her hips and torso. It was true that her firm A-cup breasts didn't bounce much, but Ginny's breath caught in her throat. She'd seen her friend bare many times in the past, going back to before either of them hit puberty—Ginny's mother thought swimming costumes a senseless waste of money, and Luna's family believed they were unhealthy and very possibly unlucky—but she'd seldom yearned so desperately to touch her in an intimate fashion as she did right now. _Missing her has taught me she's not just my dearest friend, but that I love her. Even if I_ _a_ _m_ _only_ _a foolish little girl and what I feel for Harry and Hermione is only a crush, I know I love Luna._

Father Christmas coughed. “Do take whatever clothes you like, dear girls. And it's possible I might have a few things for each of you in my bag as well. After all, as much as Miss Lovegood might wish otherwise, I'm bringing you to join your friends as comrades and helpmates. This business of being pets is something you can negotiate with them on your own time, and believe me, I'd prefer not to hear any more of it.”

Luna giggled as she put on her shirt and jumper. It was so lovely to hear her friend's gentle laughter again, and Ginny couldn't resist giving her a quick squeeze and another little kiss whilst Father Christmas' back was still turned.

When all was ready, Ginny wrote a short note to her parents and dropped it on the pillow. That done, she grasped Luna's hand, Luna grasped Father Christmas' arm, and the living personification of Yuletide cheer popped them up to the roof where his sleigh stood ready. Ginny was pretty sure there wasn't actually enough room on the roof of the Burrow for a sleigh and eight reindeer, but they were there and that was good enough for her, because she had her darling friend with her again and Father Christmas was taking them to see her other two most favourite people whom she'd missed ever since August when they'd escaped her brother Bill's wedding party with minutes to spare.

“Do you think Harry and Hermione will remember that they each still owe me a dance?” she whispered in Luna's ear as the sleigh pulled away from her childhood home.

“I can't imagine anyone as smart and thoughtful as Hermione or as clever and caring as Harry not remembering something important like that. In any case, I'll be glad to help remind them. Do you think they might give me one as well if I asked them nicely?”

Ginny planted a tiny little kiss on the tip of Luna's ear. “I'm sure they would. How could they resist dancing with you? How could anyone?”

It was already the best Christmas Ginny Weasley had ever had, and it wasn't even midnight yet.

 

#

 

Harry Potter had never been inside a church before. The Dursleys went to Saint Grogory's at Christmas and Easter so that everyone who mattered in Little Whinging would see they were good respectable members of the Church of England, not disloyal Labour-voting Communists who wanted a republic and thought the lazy scum on the dole should get champagne and caviar for every meal, dirty hippies who took drugs and chanted before foreign idols with too many arms or, worst of all, superstitious priest-ridden Roman Catholics who came from the bogs of Ireland and went to their own alien sort of church every single Sunday.

Bringing their ragged half-tinker nephew would have spoilt their image completely, so he'd always been left in his cupboard. When they were seven Dudley had told him they had a great feast of ice cream and sweets in the church, which was why nasty little freaks weren't allowed to come there, but whenever Harry overheard his cousin talking about it with his sidekick Piers Polkiss they seemed to agree it was dreadfully boring, the place smelt like dusty books and burning rubbish, and they didn't know why their parents kept dragging them there every year.

Dudley's definition of boring meant anything that didn't involve him getting to break things, torture a child smaller than him who couldn't fight back, slaughter aliens on the computer, or at least watch a film with explosions, gigantic guns, and sprays of blood in, so Harry had reckoned church might not be so bad, after all. If nothing else, it had to be better than the cupboard.

_Well, now I know it's not just 'not bad,' it's brilliant,_ he decided halfway through the service. The music was lovely and the scent of the incense was rather nice, nothing like the nasty stuff Trelawney would burn in her classroom. He wasn't sure he altogether understood the readings, but the language was beautiful and he got the feeling that the people who did them were sharing something they believed in wholeheartedly. The lingering awfulness of the Horcrux on its chain round his neck had almost completely disappeared when they stepped over the threshold, as if something in the little stone building had pushed the evil spirit of Tom Marvolo Riddle far into the background.

Best of all, Hermione was beside him and she was smiling. He'd missed her smile. He'd never realised how much it meant to him until he'd noticed that she wasn't smiling any more. He missed Ron as well, of course, but it seemed to have hit her much harder.

_Well, that's love, I suppose. I do miss Ginny. I wish she were here. She once told me that her family went to church at the holidays, so it might make her happy just as it makes Hermione happy. They'd smile at each other, and at me, and at Luna. She'd be with us because I know Ginny would like to have her best friend there to share something that made her happy. I don't know if Luna's family celebrate Christmas, but even if they don't I imagine she would enjoy the music and all the rest. She takes such pleasure in things, and it's always a delight to see._

He realised that he was drifting towards the sort of fantasy that he tried to avoid, because he thought it would make Hermione unhappy if she knew. He tried to imagine Ron being here as well, so Hermione would have the person she loved, but he couldn't. Ron would say the incense made him want to sneeze and he had never understood why people went to church instead of going to Quidditch matches. He'd probably make it into one of his jokes about all the strange things Muggles did, and Hermione would wince, but Ron, just as he always did, would never even notice it bothered her. Harry loved Ron like a brother, but that didn't stop him wanting to hit his best mate every time he hurt Hermione's feelings.

Hermione's hand brushed against his. That was nice. It happened again, and he hoped he wasn't getting too close and bothering her, but he was the one sitting at the end of the pew, and he realised that if she was close to him it must have been because she wanted to be, since there was nobody on her other side to push her closer to her male friend who was nothing more than a friend. He glanced over, their eyes met, she smiled at him, and somehow they wound up holding hands. _I always thought that was a boyfriend and girlfriend thing, but I suppose this means it's also something that people who are only friends can do. Well, it feels good and it seems to make her happy, so I'm glad we can hold hands, after all._

For a moment he thought of _The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe,_ which he'd never forgotten in all the years since the day he'd read it as he hid in a corner of the public library, back when he was in primary school. He'd desperately wished he could find a magic wardrobe to escape through. What would it be like if Voldemort were only a character in a story and instead he had to face the White Witch with Hermione, Ginny, and Luna? He imagined the four of them kneeling before Aslan, being simultaneously married and crowned as king and queens of Narnia. _Stop it, Harry. Aslan wouldn't tell you to be a good husband to the three girls beside you. Even if H_ _e_ _woul_ _d, Hermione would never want to be in a harem, and neither would Ginny. Luna probably wouldn't, either._

It wasn't very hard to bring his mind back to what was going on in the church, because he had his best friend beside him. She was clearly happy, and her happiness was all he needed to be happy as well. Hermione knew all the songs, it seemed. He'd never realised what a nice voice she had, and he wondered why she didn't sing more often. He sang along with what he could, and he hoped he wasn't hurting her ears. She smiled when he sang, so he supposed it wasn't too horrible.

When it was over, she kept on holding his hand, and they stayed in the pew until most of the people had left. When they did leave the pew, Hermione dropped to one knee and made that crossing gesture again. Harry copied her as well as he could, and she beamed at him. “Let's go out in the market square, Harry. I've got this feeling we might find something important there. If you don't mind waiting to visit the churchyard?”

“Not at all, Hermione. I trust your feelings.”

“Thank you, Harry. I... I'm trying to trust my feelings as well. I've been ignoring them for too long, really.”

He didn't know what to say to that, but he apparently didn't need to say anything, because Hermione crossed the little space between them and hugged him tightly, and he hugged her right back. She snuggled into his embrace, nuzzling his cheek, which she'd never done before. He would have worried that they were betraying Ginny—the two of them had said they were breaking up, of course, but it was only because he had to leave, and they'd kissed again in August—but he had the strangest feeling that she wouldn't mind. She'd told him she trusted Hermione to take care of him and him to take care of Hermione, a day or two before Bill's wedding, back before the Ministry fell and Kingsley Shacklebolt's Patronus told them to flee. _It's just friendship, in any case. It's not as if we're snogging or sleeping in the same bed or looking at each other naked._

They walked arm in arm out into the square. Everyone seemed to have gone home, and the town was quiet, with only a few lights showing in the windows, as if the people of Godric's Hollow had wanted to leave Harry and Hermione their privacy. The moon was out, and Harry imagined they looked like a couple strolling together. He felt the presence of Tom Riddle's soul fragment a little more than he had inside the church, but it was still muted compared to what it had been earlier in the day, as if perhaps something about Christmas was keeping the Dark Lord at bay, an older magic that they'd never been taught at Hogwarts. Somewhere in the corner of his mind he wondered if holding hands with Hermione might have done it, but that was silly. Surely if there were anything as simple as holding hands that could have an effect, his brilliant best friend would have read about it already.

What was that sitting on the cobblestones, over on the opposite end of the square, in the corner by a chip shop and the Rose and Crown Public House? Was it a car or a lorry decorated for the holiday? No, it was an old-fashioned sleigh. That didn't make sense in the middle of a town when there wasn't some kind of a fair on, even aside from the fact that there was hardly any snow on the ground. A sleigh drawn by eight reindeer? And was that truly a man in red, helping someone to climb down from the seat? “Hermione? Are you seeing what I'm seeing?”

“Are you seeing Father Christmas and his sleigh?” There was a hint of sweet laughter in her voice.

“Yes. I know he's only a story, but...”

“I'm seeing them as well, Harry.”

“Oh, in Aslan's name!” Harry didn't know why he'd said that. He liked the idea of the great lion, of course, and after he'd read about Narnia he'd sometimes talked to Aslan and asked Him for help because it felt nice to think that Someone might be listening, even if it was only in his imagination, but he did know it was just a children's book. He was embarrassed at sounding so foolish in front of Hermione.

She pressed a little kiss on his cheek, which made him feel warm. “Thank Aslan, Harry! Since you can see him, I suppose I'm not going mad, after all. Come along, my dearest friend. Let's go and see what Father Christmas has got to say to us. And maybe, since you've been a good boy and I've been a good girl this year, he'll even have brought us presents!” Hermione's laugh was usually more of a chuckle or even a chortle, strengthening into a full-fledged guffaw on the rare but delightful occasions when something amused her to the point of overcoming her natural reserve, but if anyone else had made the sound she did just then, he would have called it a giggle.

As they got closer, he realised that there really was a sturdy man, not fat in the way Uncle Vernon was, but portly, dressed in a red suit with white fur trim, standing next the sleigh. And were there two girls beside him? A redhead and a blonde?

Hermione almost squealed in surprise and delight. “Oh Harry, my heart, look!” She took a tight grip of his hand and broke into a run, tugging him along with her. They met Ginny and Luna halfway and fell into a great four-person embrace.

“Happy Christmas, my darling Harry and Hermione Potter,” Luna said. Even for her, that was an unusual thing to say, but Harry didn't care because Hermione looked radiantly happy. If Luna calling her by his surname made her feel that way, how could he mind? Especially when Ginny looked utterly delighted as well.

“Yes. Happy Christmas, Harry and Hermione. I love you both.” She looked him in the eye for a long moment. His breath caught in his throat. “I'll kiss you in a moment, Harry, but first... may I kiss you, Hermione, please?”

His best friend flushed fetchingly. “Yes,” she said in a tiny voice, barely more than a whisper. Ginny smiled and leant forward until her lips were against Hermione's. And slowly, meltingly, Harry's red-headed once-and-hopefully-future girlfriend and his brown-haired dearest friend-who-was-also-a-girl kissed each other. He didn't dare allow himself to think about what it meant, but he knew in the very marrow of his bones that it was a good thing.

After they broke the kiss, they remained nose-to-nose for another long moment, looking in each others' eyes. And then Ginny rubbed her nose against Hermione's and said “Of course you should, silly!”

He didn't understand what she was getting at for a moment, or perhaps he still couldn't let himself be so bold as to think she might mean what he wished, but Hermione turned her face a little to the side and they were nose-to-nose. “Harry? May I... may I kiss you, please?”

He knew what he should say at once, even though it took him a second try before he could get the words out. “Of course you may, Hermione.” And even as he spoke the last syllable of her name, she pressed her lips to his, and they kissed.

It was incredible. More than that, it felt right. He wondered why they hadn't done this years earlier. They could have kissed after the incident with the troll, even though Ron would probably have had a fit. They could have kissed the very first time Hermione ever hugged him, there in the chamber beneath the Third Floor Corridor. There had been dozens of other times over the years, he realised.

But none of it mattered any more, because they were kissing now. And Ginny and Luna were hugging them close, which meant that they both approved of Harry and Hermione kissing. That was excellent, and it made him feel even warmer and more content inside than the simple act of kissing Hermione did all by itself. The taste of Hermione's mouth was intoxicating, and he was glad she and Ginny had kissed, because he would have been sad not to share such a wonderful experience with his favourite ginger.

Their lips parted for a moment, and they looked each other in the eye. “I'm not your sister, Harry, am I?”

“I've never had one, but I can't believe kissing a sister would feel like that. I'm not your brother, am I?”

“Heavens, no. Ron's the one who treats me about the same as he treats our Ginny. I love you, Harry.”

“I love you, Hermi—mmph.“ This time she kissed him before he could finish saying her name.

When they were done, Ginny smiled at them. “Oh Merlin, that was beautiful. May I have a turn, now?”

“Please do, Harry,” Hermione whispered. “She's a lovely kisser. And so are you, actually.”

Without another word, he was kissing Ginny for the first time in months. It felt and tasted wonderful, even better than their kisses at the Burrow in August or back at Hogwarts in the Spring. He realised that Luna and Hermione were kissing each other. It made him happy that they could enjoy each other's company in just the same way as he and Ginny were enjoying themselves.

When that was done, it seemed the most natural thing in the world for him to kiss Luna. She was sweet and tender, and perhaps a little bit more shy than the other two girls, which made sense as she didn't know him quite as well, but kissing her was just as lovely an experience as kissing them. She nibbled his lip with her teeth at the end of the kiss as if she didn't want to let go. A moment more went by, and she opened her eyes, grinning wider than he ever would have imagined quiet little Luna could have done. After another moment, she touched the very tip of her tongue to his nose. “You taste wonderful, Harry Potter.”

“So do you, Luna Lovegood.”

Father Christmas coughed rather loudly. “Young love is a fine thing, but I'm afraid there are some other things that want doing tonight. Once this business with foolish young Tom Riddle is over, the four of you can take a long holiday somewhere and I'm sure you'll be able to do all the kissing you'd like to do.”

Luna was almost glowing, and she planted a tender little kiss on Ginny's cheek. “Oh, I think we'll need years and years and years to even begin to do that, Father Christmas. Really, two or even four centuries couldn't possibly be enough, so I have to believe there's kissing in Heaven. But a holiday sounds a fine and lovely thing, maybe to some place in the tropics where Ginevra and I will be very comfortable in our favourite dress. And is there an address at which we could reach you? I'd love to send you a postcard.”

“Thank you, Miss Lovegood, but that isn't necessary. I'll know you're happy, and that will be quite enough for me.”

“I promise it wouldn't be anything that might embarrass you, like a picture of the four of us at the beach. I wouldn't send one of those to my Daddy, either. But if it's a particularly nice beach I might send you a picture that doesn't have us in it, in case you might like to go there with Mrs. Christmas some time.” Harry wasn't sure why a beach picture would be embarrassing, but Luna seemed to know all sorts of unusual things, and Father Christmas certainly did seem embarrassed about something. He wore very old-fashioned clothes, so perhaps swimming costumes disturbed him because they didn't cover girls' ankles and elbows?

“That's very kind, Miss Lovegood, and I'm sure my lady will be grateful that you thought of her. For now, let's be on our way. Nobody's going to notice us here, but it's not a good place for the four of you to make camp and I can't very well deliver your presents until you've a roof over your heads.” Father Christmas had the look of someone who liked everyone around him a great deal but wished all the same that he were far, far away at the present moment, something like how Professor McGonagall had looked one evening at dinner during the Christmas holidays in First Year when Professor Dumbledore talked about what a fine dancer his old friend Gellert had been. At the time, Harry had wondered if McGonagall had danced with this Gellert person and if maybe she'd trod on his foot by accident or he'd stepped on the hem of her dress and torn it or somebody had enchanted little birds to chase them off the dance floor and Gellert had blamed her.

Now, of course, he knew the Headmaster had been talking about Gellert Grindelwald, and he understood where McGonagall was coming from. It wasn't Dumbledore having danced with a man that bothered him; after all, Harry was certain he loved both Ginny and Hermione, he was surer with every minute that went by that he was in love with Luna as well, and it was increasingly clear that the girls all loved each other. It would have been hypocritical of him to have a problem with Dumbledore being in love with Alastor Moody, say, or his old friend Elphias Doge. But the Graf von Grindelwald? The butcher of Nurmengard? The man Tom Marvolo Riddle had first taken as a role model, and then made it his life's work to outdo? That was a bit much, wasn't it?

“He wasn't always a bad person, Mister Potter, but he valued power more than love and it made a monster of him. Remember not to do that, won't you?”

Harry looked up, surprised. But this was Father Christmas, after all. Children were told that he knew if they'd been bad or good, no matter where in the world they were. Once he'd got past the shock of finding out that the legendary man in the red suit with the reindeer-drawn sleigh was a real person, why should he be surprised to find out said sleigh-driver was able to read his surface thoughts, at the very least? “Err...”

Father Christmas grinned ruefully. “It's a gift I can't turn off, much as I might sometimes wish to. And believe me, Mister Potter, I'd not want to look any closer even if I were able. Miss Lovegood telling me what she'd like to do with yourself and your two other lovely ladies is too much already for this old man.”

“But I only said I hoped they would put collars on me and Ginevra. I didn't say anything about how I'd like Harry and Hermione to spread me out on a massage table and bind my hands and feet to the corners and tickle my... oh, sorry, I'm doing it again, amn't I?” Luna's face looked mildly pink, although maybe it was just from the cold.

“It's fine, Miss Lovegood. I know it's only your natural enthusiasm for the people you love and you don't mean anything by it. So, shall we be on our way? I do wish we could at least get the four of you handfasted before I leave you alone, since I know full well what young people are like and it would be unfair to expect you to act like sisters and like brother, but it's no great sin and I've certainly got worse things on my conscience.”

“Pardon me, Father Christmas, but I do imagine I might be able to give yourself and these four a bit of assistance in that regards.”

Shocked, Harry drew his wand, turning to face the tall, reed-slender man who came striding across the cobblestones. He looked vaguely familiar. _A Death Eater,_ _or_ _just_ _someone from one of the shops in Hogsmeade or Diagon Alley_ _? But no. That's a black coat, not robes, and he's got one of those funny white collars on his shirt... wait, is_ _he_ _the priest?_ The man had worn bright vestments when he conducted the service, but it did make sense that he wouldn't wear things like that all the time, now that Harry thought about it.

“Father Godwin Athanasius Bones, Church of England, at your service. Peace of Christ and blessings of Christmastide on all here.”

Father Christmas gave him a courtly bow. “I'm impressed, Father Bones. Not many can see me when I don't intend them to, even wizards and priests.”

The priest returned the bow. “Thank you, Father Christmas. I never cared for Divination when I was at Hogwarts, but a touch of the Second Sight does run in my family. I was finishing up my sermon for tomorrow morning and looking forward to joining my wife in bed when I got the strangest feeling I might be needed out here. Good job the rectory's so close to the square, isn't it?”

“It is, now that you mention it. I'm not really authorised to officiate at a wedding, so I suppose you'd be willing to take care of it?”

Harry realised his wand was still in his hand, and he tried to sheathe it unobtrusively. He felt a bit better when he noticed that Hermione and Ginny were doing likewise. _Being married sounds wonderful._ _More than that, it sounds right._ _B_ _ut I've not even_ _proposed to_ _the girls, or given them rings, or anything. And aren't I meant to ask their parents' permission or something like that?_

“Of course I would. At the very least, I'd be remiss not to offer them my services. Harry Potter, I presume? I was there at your christening, although old Father Watkins was the actual celebrant. And may I surmise these are Hermione Granger, Luna Lovegood, and Ginny Weasley?”

Harry still felt a bit on edge, but he knew Father Bones meant them no harm. _Even aside from the fact that Voldemort doesn't seem like somebody who'd approve of a church that has Muggles in, we've got a friend here who can fly_ _a sleigh_ _round the world_ _in a single night_ _without anybody seeing him, so we'_ _re sure to be_ _safe. I_ _'d never really thought about there being_ _priests_ _who_ _were_ _also W_ _izards, but_ _there's a church in Hogsmeade so I suppose there would have to be._ _I wonder if he's related to Susan?_   “Yes, Sir... err, Father.”

“My niece has said so much about you and your friends, Mister Potter. It's a pleasure and an honour to finally meet you again after seventeen years. I'd say you've grown taller, but that seems rather obvious, doesn't it?”

“Susan Bones is your niece? Is... I hope she's all right.”

“She and her young man and their special friend are just fine. I'm given to understand that they and some of their colleagues have taken up residence in a disused part of the Castle, but they're safe enough and it sounds as if they're actually rather happy. I suppose I should wish the three of them had married before they started sharing a bed, but at least they're engaged and I certainly can't blame them under the circumstances. It used to be common enough for folk to plight their troths and consider themselves wed, and it's no wonder the custom would come back in these difficult times.”

_Young man and special friend? Neville and Hannah? Well, fair play to_ _them._ “I'm glad to hear that. She spoke up for me a couple of times when most of the other Hufflepuffs were sure I was the Heir of Slytherin or a Tri-Wizard cheat.”

“She's a good girl, and I'm proud she's my niece,” Father Bones said. “I'm glad she's finally seen Hannah and young Neville in the way everyone else has been seeing the three of them since they were little. Especially if I'm to say your wedding, because a few years ago she might have been put out at not being included amongst your wives.”

Luna giggled. “Well, Susan's very pretty and I'm sure she gives nice kisses, but I do have to say Harry and Hermione and Ginevra are enough for me. Besides, she and Neville and Hannah look simply lovely together. Their auras are very compatible.”

“They are, aren't they? But I expect you've more important things to do than engage in small talk out here in the cold. Haven't you a question to ask these lovely young women, Harry?”

He turned away from Father Bones and Father Christmas, towards Hermione and Ginny and Luna. He'd imagined proposing to Ginny any number of times during that brief period before Dumbledore died, when they were simply an ordinary couple. He'd often dreamt of proposing to Hermione in their first few years of school, before he convinced himself that it simply wasn't safe to even think about her that way when she surely thought of him as her brother, because he couldn't risk losing his best friend. He'd never imagined proposing to Luna, but now that he thought about it he couldn't imagine why not.

In all of those daydream proposals, they'd been older, he'd been able to buy proper rings, and of course there had been only one of them because he'd never even dared to wonder if it might possible for him to marry his three favourite girls. He'd tried his best not to fantasise about the four of them being together, and when he had done the fantasies had always been set in some exotic environment where they didn't have to worry about marriage: the far away past where he was a barbarian lord, Hermione was his lady, and Ginny and Luna were a pair of innocent village maidens they'd picked up during a raid; the distant future where he was an interstellar pirate, Hermione was a captain in the Royal Space Navy who surrendered herself to him in exchange for the release of her crew, and Ginny and Luna were the loyal lieutenants who refused to leave her side even when informed that the Dread Pirate Potter would personally remove every thread of their uniforms, including bras, knickers, and socks, as soon as they boarded his flagship, since he followed an ancient religion which required him to keep his lovely captive officers in his private quarters and to spoil them with every luxury except garments to hide their beauty; a private tropical island where he found the girls on the beach outside his comfortable little house when they swam ashore from a shipwreck in which none of the three had been hurt but all of them had lost their clothes. He hadn't the least idea what to say, but he knew he had to say something.

He dropped to one knee. “Hermione Granger, you've been my best friend ever since a possessed Defence instructor let a mountain troll into Hogwarts. You've stood beside me even when I was an awful prat and I tried to push you away. You've taught me what love is, even though it's taken me six years and more to work out that I was in love with you. Will you marry me, even if it means, err... sharing me with Ginny and Luna?”

“Yes, Harry. And what's more, I'll share _them_ with _you_.”

“Ginny Weasley, it took me far too many years to get to know you as more than my best mate's little sister, and I'll spend the rest of my life doing whatever I can to make up for that, because you're so much more, and you mean so much more to me than Ron ever did or could. I love you. Will you marry me?”

“Yes, Harry. And I'll marry Hermione and Luna as well.”

“Luna Lovegood, you're one of the most unique and thoughtful people I've ever known. You comforted me through the loss of my godfather, you've been my friend from the moment I met you, and somehow along the way I fell in love with you without even realising I had done. Will you marry me? And Hermione and Ginny?”

“I will, Harry. With all my heart, with all my soul, with all my mind and body, and with all of anything that's mine which I might be forgetting.”

The girls took his hand and raised him to his feet. He wasn't sure which one he should kiss first, but Ginny and Luna pushed Hermione forward and they embraced. “Once we've got a little privacy and your glasses are off,” she whispered in his ear, “I think we'll have to work out if we can get all our lips together at once or if we'll just have to kiss in pairs. Either way, it will be perfect.” They kissed, and she handed him off to Ginny, who handed him off to Luna.

“I'm sorry I've no engagement rings to give you,” he said when they had all been kissed. “I'll get you all proper ones as soon as I'm able, even if I will be doing it after we've married.”

“It's fine, Harry,” Luna said. “I'm your betrothed, and I'll be your wife and Ginny's and Hermione's, whether I've a ring or not. Just as I'm your pet whether I've a collar or not.”

_A collar? Is she talking about what I think she might be talking about?_ During the summer before Third Year when he'd been stuck alone in the smallest bedroom in the Dursley house, Harry had got so bored that he read the dirty books and magazines Dudley had hidden there so his mother wouldn't find them. Amongst them were a couple of paperback novels about a planet on the other side of the sun which was called Gor. It was a world where extremely manly men rode about on giant birds, attacked each others' cities, and had a great deal of sex with slave girls who wore steel collars and often nothing else.

Those books made him very uncomfortable, and not just because the writing was so bad that even a boy who was counting the days till his thirteenth birthday knew it was a crime against the English language. He hated the viciousness and cruelty that were so prevalent on the fictional planet, and he detested the way that they were written about as if they were somehow admirable. The constant ranting about how slave girls were only worthless animals who could be killed if they weren't pleasing made him wish he could find the author, Transfigure him into a worm, and stomp on him until there'd be nothing left but a thin layer of reddish-brown paste smeared on the pavement for the ants to clean up.

But at the same time, something about the idea of a naked girl smiling happily at him as he put a collar round her neck, because it was what they both wanted and she knew she'd be his forever and he'd never sell her or hurt her or humiliate her, was incredibly arousing. She would have had to be a friend, of course, or at least a nice ordinary girl of about his own age who'd become his friend as soon as they got to know each other, not one of the rather terrifying adult women from Dudley's pornography, whose bodies looked almost as if they were made of plastic and whose smiles never reached their eyes.

_The books_ _talked about slave girls_ _having the looks of_ _actresses or fashion models, but I knew I wanted somebody_ _I could be comfortable with,_ _a girl_ _who_ _might_ _get spots just as I did,_ _a_ _nd it would be just fine if she were plump or skinny_ _compared_ _with_ _other girls_ _, because I was certainly kind of scrawny myself_ _._ _I was curious about sex, of cours_ _e, and what a girl's body would feel like as she squirmed and wriggled and squealed at my touch_ _, but my fantasies were just as much about_ _cuddling up and reading together,_ _taking_ _a walk_ _and_ _sharing_ _a picnic_ _lunch_ _on a warm day_ _in_ _some very pretty_ _wood where there weren't any thorns or_ _nettles or_ _sharp rocks to hurt her_ _bare_ _feet and nobody else was a_ _bout_ _so she wouldn't have to be embarrassed at them seeing her naked,_ _or how_ _I'd_ _tickle_ _my slave_ _and she'd laugh and tickle me right back._ _O_ _r sometimes she'd tickle me fi_ _rst, even though I'd collared her, because it_ _made_ _us both happy._ He hadn't known what to make of those thoughts, and he'd wondered if it meant he was a terrible person and if Hermione would hate him if she knew what dreadful things were going on inside his head, even if she didn't realise that she was one of the girls he was thinking of.

At his annual physical that Autumn, Madam Pomfrey had told him it was completely normal for boys and girls of his age to have sexual fantasies and as long as he wasn't aroused by the idea of raping someone or otherwise doing actual harm to her he shouldn't worry about anything his mind came up with. She also gave him a set of pamphlets about sexuality, which, along with a fascinating and blush-inducing explanation of different ways to give a girl an orgasm without having intercourse, included the concept of safe words and a bit of advice about how to safely tie someone up and give her the sensation of being spanked without hurting her. _I hope she says that to everyone and gives_ _all of them_ _exactly the same pamphlets, because as much as I'm grateful for it I_ _'m not sure I_ _like the idea of her knowing_ that _much about_ _my fantasies_ _._

In any event, Ginny and Hermione were smiling so he knew they were happy with what Luna had said, which was the most important thing of all. Hermione gave Luna a gentle little squeeze about the shoulders. “I'm sure Harry and I will be able to do something about that as well, my dear.”

“Thank you, Mistress. And if you would like to wear a collar as well, sometimes, I wouldn't mind, and I'm sure Ginevra won't, either. We're not selfish that way.”

Ginny kissed each of the other girls on the cheek. “That would be lovely, actually.”

Hermione grinned. “Maybe I would, now that you mention it. And don't worry, Harry, we'll talk more about this later. I'm pretty sure you're going to like it.”

“I think I've got the idea. And if it's what all my girls would like, I'm sure I'll have a wonderful time being Master to my cuddly pets, and I promise to do my very best to make it a wonderful time for them as well.” They hugged him, and there was another swift round of kisses.

He was amused to note that Father Bones and Father Christmas were turned away from them, facing the church and doing their best to ignore what was going on behind their backs. Each had a pipe in his mouth. “This Beckham fellow's plenty good,” Father Christmas said, “but he's not a patch on Jock Graham of the Peartree. I once saw him play a match in Bewcastle, back in the day. Horrible man, really, a nasty piece of work even by sixteenth century Borderer standards, but the things he could do with a football... well, you'd swear he had magic, unless you were someone like us who could see full well that he was as mundane as your average cabbage, and even then it was a bit hard to believe he was really doing all that without some sort of a charm or a spell.”

Father Bones blew a smoke ring. “Ah, but it wasn't the same sort of football, was it, mate? No Association to speak of back then, no referees, no Laws of the Game. I'm told it would make rugby and Aussie rules look like a lot of little schoolgirls playing rounders and trying not to get dirt on their pinafores.”

“Aye, but... well, it looks as if our young people have done their proposing and accepting and what have you, so I suppose we'll have to continue this discussion at a later date.”

“We will. I'll bring the whisky. I've a case of twenty year Laphroaig in the cellar.”

“Excellent! I'll bring the tobacco. I've some simply smashing stuff laid aside. It's genuine Longbottom Leaf.”

“Oh, I've missed that! I was just old enough to appreciate the difference between quality tobacco and the cheap rubbish when the Longbottoms stopped growing it. I'd suggest my niece should get her young Neville to take his family back into the tobacco business, but I know it's no use. She thinks it's a foul weed even if it won't destroy the lungs as the Muggle kind does, and their Hannah agrees with her.”

Father Christmas clapped him on the back. “Just you wait till you try the Longbottom Leaf they grew in the Shire during the Third Age, my friend.”

A door opened in one of the houses, and a woman came out, bundled into a greatcoat, a Muggle torch in one hand and a wand in the other. She was at least as tall as Father Bones, with the broad shoulders of a Beater. “Godwin Bones, whatever are you up to? Don't forget you'll have to say the Mass at ten of the clock tomorrow morning, and you know what you're like when you've not had enough sleep.”

“I'll be along in a minute, Peg. Just a bit of pastoral duty I've got to take care of first.”

“Pastoral duty? I smell _smoke,_ Godwin, and I've got this intuition you've been talking sport just now.”

“Good evening, Ma'am,” Father Christmas said. “I'm sorry for keeping your husband out of your house.”

“Oh, never you mind, he'd most likely do it anyhow, so he would. And might I presume you're not just dressed up as Father Christmas because you're coming from a fancy dress party and you couldn't be bothered to change first?”

“Indeed you might, Ma'am.”

“Father Christmas, this is my wife, Margaret Bones _née_ Bulstrode. Peg, this is, just as you surmise, Father Christmas.”

“Pleased to meet you! It isn't every Christmas one meets a genuine personification of festive cheer and holiday giving. Queen Mab did like to come round to my mum and dad's for a drink at the New Year, but that wasn't the same at all.” They shook hands.

“Mab's a good friend, but she can be a bit overwhelming, especially on a festive occasion. I do take it you might be a distant cousin of hers yourself. An honour to meet you, Mrs Bones.”

“Oh, call me Peg, you old charmer. We're very likely cousins as well, some way or other.”

Father Bones guffawed. “And may I present Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Ginevra Weasley, and Luna Lovegood?”

“Well met, my dears! I'm Margaret Bones. Do call me Peg, please. And are these _men_ smoking their pipes and going on about the football when there are young people out of doors in the middle of the night who should be in bed, and I'll not ask how many beds they should be in as it's none of my business? Or how few either, of course.”

Luna smiled and curtsied. “Actually, ma'am, they were giving us privacy whilst Harry proposed to us and we agreed we'd marry him and each other. Please don't be too hard on your husband.”

“Ah, I couldn't be, lass. We're together ever since the day in our Second Year when a faulty Bludger knocked the bat out my hand at Quidditch practice and clocked him in the head. Poppy Pomfrey said he was back to normal when she released him from the Hospital Wing that evening, but I've always suspected there was a little lingering brain damage, so I have to make allowances.” She put her arm about her husband, and Harry saw she was at least two inches taller. _Ron would_ _snicker at that, and_ _make some kind of crac_ _k as soon as he thought they were out of earshot_ _, but I think they look well together._ _Hermione was taller than me up until Fourth Year._

“I was just going to say a quick wedding for these four, and then I'll be back inside, love. Would you care to witness?”

“I would surely be delighted! I played a few good matches alongside Selene Lethbridge, back in the day, and Molly Weasley was a worthy opponent, one of the best Chasers I ever hit a Bludger at. I regret I never knew your mother well, Harry, as she and your father were First Years when I was in my Seventh, but I heard many wonderful things of them both.”

“Very well, then, shall we begin?”

Father Christmas dug through his bag. “Here, it looks as if I've got four wedding rings. I'll hand them out as needed, will I?”

Mrs. Bones shook her head. “Men! Surely there's time to go and do this in the church, at least? It's bad enough that the poor girls won't have any chance to dress up. The very least we can do is give them a better backdrop than a couple of glowing signs advertising mediocre ales and worse lagers. Whitbread, for shame!”

Harry looked at Father Christmas, who nodded his head. “It shouldn't be a problem. And I suppose you're right. If nothing else, I can't risk you telling my lady I let a young man and his lovely brides be married outside a pub with my reindeer standing in for guests.”

Most of the wedding ceremony was a blur for Harry. All he could remember, afterwards, were the soft smiles on his wives' faces as each said “I do” in response to “Do you take this man and these women to be your husband and wives?” and the glow of the rings on their fingers. That stood out, as did Father Bones saying “You may kiss the brides,” not to mention the kisses.

Somewhere in the distance Tom Riddle was in agony, but Harry Potter didn't care enough about the self-styled Lord Voldemort to pay him any real mind when his very own girls were so radiantly happy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I encountered the Gor books at approximately the same age as Harry did, and his reaction is mine, excepting the fact that Transfiguring John Norman into a worm and stomping on him wasn't an option for me.
> 
> And, just in case you're someone who can't tell the difference between a character's opinions and an author's: Ron probably didn't mean everything he said to Ginny. He's not nearly the traitor she thinks of him as being, but I don't think any of us are terribly rational about people who badmouth our loves, especially not at sixteen years of age.


	2. From Godric's Hollow to the Forest of Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Hermione felt as if she should pinch herself, but she knew she didn't need to. Marrying Harry, and Ginny, and Luna, in a church, with a very proper priest officiating who was not only a wizard but also Susan Bones' uncle was altogether too strange to be a dream. _Not to mention Father Bones being married to Millicent Bulstrode's first cousin once removed. Or Father Christmas not only being a real person but acting as one of our witnesses._ "

Hermione felt as if she should pinch herself, but she knew she didn't need to. Marrying Harry, and Ginny, and Luna, in a church, with a very proper priest officiating who was not only a wizard but also Susan Bones' uncle was altogether too strange to be a dream. _Not to mention Father Bones being married to Millicent Bulstrode's first cousin once removed. Or Father Christmas_ _not only being_ _a_ _real_ _person_ _but_ _acting as_ _one of our witnesses._

“Good bye, my dears. God bless. And should you see my young cousin, please do you give her my best. According to the last owl I had of her, she's run off to the Forbidden Forest with a Ravenclaw named Terry Boot—a nice fellow, to judge by the once I met him, and he and Millie have been stepping out together since sometime last winter—and a pair of orphaned Hufflepuff First Years whom they've more or less adopted, even if they themselves are only six years older than the poor dears.”

“Really? Good for them,” Hermione said politely. Millicent Bulstrode had sought her out at the beginning of Third Year and apologised profusely for putting her in a headlock during the lone meeting of Lockhart's idiotic duelling club, but she'd never felt entirely comfortable with the tall Slytherin girl. She was more trustworthy than most others in her House, but that didn't seem to be saying so very much.

“She and Mister Boot found the young Nott and his cronies holding the poor Firsties at wandpoint in a corridor. The vile creatures were hitting the girls with little doses of the torture curse, telling them to strip off and to make it interesting if they wanted to live because it was time they learnt 'the one thing Puffs are good for,' so Millie and her young man took care of business with no warning beyond a couple of good blasting and cutting curses each.”

“Good Heavens! I... I'm afraid I don't know Millicent or Terry very well, but that was incredibly brave of them and I'm glad they did it.” Hermione knew Nott was a miserable bigoted cur, a bully and a blow-hard, but she'd never thought he was a rapist. _Even Malfoy_ _never struck_ _me that way. Then again, he was_ _nearly_ _always with Parkinson_ _since_ _Second_ _Year or so_ _, and for all their_ _faul_ _ts it seemed clear they truly did care for each other._ _There were times I used to wish I_ _'d been born_ _a Pureblood and my parents and Harry's_ _family_ _had made a betrothal contract for us just as theirs_ _had done_ _for them._ _Well, it worked out all right for us in the end, didn't it?_ Her husband took her hand, and it was all she could do not to break out in a silly grin.

“With the way things are at Hogwarts now, they knew they'd all four face Azkaban or worse, so they got the children out the castle before anyone came round to investigate. I do hope the poor little dears had their eyes closed when the spells hit. It's bad enough that a pair of Seventh Years had to see what they were forced to do to those villains.”

“I'm so glad they were there to protect them,” Ginny murmured. “Nott made my skin crawl. I always thought he was worse than Malfoy, really.”

“Aye. God forgive me for being so prejudiced, but I can't help thinking the apple didn't fall far from the tree. My dear friend Helen Standish was in Slytherin, and she told me Theodore Nott Senior and his mates were the reason she and the other girls in her House all carried daggers in their garters or tucked into their sleeves even when they were Firsties.”

“My mother would be horrified, I'm afraid, but I can't blame them at all. I would've carried one myself.”

“I would have done as well. Any road, they saved the girls and got safely away, thank God. The four of them are living in the centaur village now. Millicent says the Chief Centaur—that's a fellow named Firenze, now, which I suppose means old Magorian's shuffled off this mortal coil, God rest his crusty soul—invited her and Mister Boot—wait, he's family now, so I should call him Terry—and little Edith and Dymphna to move into his own house along with his wife and children and sisters. The centaurs have big round houses that a whole extended family will share, by the way, rather like something out of the Bronze Age, so it's not as if they're crammed into the garret or sleeping in the sitting room or what have you.”

“Oh, interesting,” Luna said. “Professor Firenze taught at Hogwarts last year, but I didn't get the impression the other centaurs liked him so very much. He's a good man, and I'm glad his people changed their minds about him.”

Hermione shivered, thinking of Magorian, who'd scarce seemed to think any better of her and Harry than he did of Dolores Umbridge. “I didn't think the centaurs liked anybody connected with Hogwarts.”

“Oh, they're not such bad folk if you know how to talk to them,” Mrs. Bones said. “We Bulstrodes have had dealings with them for years. They like to sound well hard, and anybody who tries to harm them is committing suicide in a particularly messy fashion, but they've a great sense of justice and a soft spot for children and non-combatants. When the Forbidden Forest group found out Millie and Terry had killed four wizards to stop them raping two young girls who weren't even their kin or in the same House as either of them, the whole tribe decided they were actually centaurs who'd somehow been born with only two legs apiece. Firenze himself was the celebrant at their handfasting, but I expect they'll have a church wedding as well once things have calmed down.”

Father Bones put his arm about his wife. “Speaking of which, my dear, we should let these young people get on with their wedding night. It's been a pleasure and an honour, Harry and Hermione and Ginny and Luna.”

“Thank you so much, Father. And thank you for saying the Christmas Mass as well. It was lovely. I've not been in a few years, and I don't think Harry had ever been, and... sorry, I'm babbling.” Hermione knew she'd be as red as a beet.

“Not at all, Mrs. Potter. It's very natural, under the circumstances.”

“I only wish my parents could have been here. They're in Australia now. I managed to talk them into hiding under false names, and they gave me permission to set up a memory charm so any Occlumens would think they really were John and Jeanette Wilkes rather than Adelbert and Victoria Granger, but I wonder if they'll ever forgive me for getting married before I took my N.E.W.T.S., much less started university, and without even telling them first.”

Mrs. Bones patted her shoulder. “I'm sure they'll be delighted with your lovely husband and wives.”

“And if you'd like I'd be very happy to officiate at a more formal ceremony sometime in the future when you're able to have your families attend.”

“That... that would be lovely. But I'm a Muggleborn, and I'm not sure what my grandmother and aunts and uncles would think. Not that I'm not proud of and delighted with my husband and wives and over the Moon at marrying them, but.... well, I'm sure you know relationships like ours aren't, err, common in Muggle society. My grandmother, at least, will be grateful for my getting married in a church and not a register office, and I expect it will please Cousin Merrily who's a curate in Liverpool, but I'm not sure that will be enough to make up for the shock of me marrying Ginny and Luna along with Harry.”

“You're hardly the first bride, or groom, to face a similar situation,” Father Bones said. “There are charms we can use. During the ceremony and the reception, it will seem perfectly commonplace and unremarkable to all of your relations that you have married a man and two other women. When they think about it afterwards they might only remember it was a beautiful ceremony and you had such lovely bridesmaids who were obviously very dear friends of yours and your young man's, but in any case it should all be fine. And I'm certain your parents will understand and approve. Anyone who sees the four of you together will know how much you love each other.”

“And don't forget my husband has the Second Sight when you hear him say that. So, go safely and God bless, my dears.”

Hermione blinked back the sudden happy tears that welled up in her eyes. “God... God bless you both, Father Bones and Mrs. Bones.”

“I do hope you'll call me Peg in the future, my dear girl.” Mrs. Bones hugged her, and her wives, and Harry. _My wives. Not just Harry's other wives, but my wives. And Harry,_ _my_ _loyal, handsome Harry whom I've loved since I was barely twelve years of age, is_ _my husband._ _I don't have to settle for Ron to preserve our friendship, I don't have to fear taking him away from Ginny any more than I have to fear taking_ _our darling sparkle-bright_ _Ginny away from him, and sweet funny brilliant Luna is ours to cherish_ _forever_ _._ _Thank_ _Y_ _ou, Aslan._ _I have to confess_ _I'm starting to believe that_ _Y_ _ou_ _a_ _re more than just a hallucination. Maybe I'll even learn to call_ _Y_ _ou by_ _Y_ _our other name_ _s_ _._

Somewhere in the back of her mind, a lion chuckled. _Thank you, Daughter of Eve. Take care of your loves, be good and kind and loving,_ _brave and bright and bold,_ _as_ _is your nature_ _, and the rest will sort itself._

Out in the market square, they climbed up into the sleigh. Luna took a moment to pet the reindeer first, and Hermione wished she'd thought of it herself.

“You and the others can greet them after we land, sweet,” the little Ravenclaw whispered in her ear. “They'll understand why you were distracted. And yes, my treasure, we'll be able to skim each others' surface thoughts and feelings. It's an old, old magical phenomenon that happens to all newly-weds for at least the first lunar month after their wedding. Some scholars think it might even go back to the Strongbrow People, the ones Muggles call Neanderthals. There's one old folk tale that says it's because of a spell the First Witch cast the morning after the first time she had sex with the First Wizard, because she didn't want to do it a second time until she was sure he knew how to make her come and she wanted all her descendants to have a better experience.”

“Oh, interesting. I really should learn more about Wizarding folklore, shouldn't I?”

“And I'll be happy to teach you all I know, my lovely Hermione, and to learn more from you as we study together. Myself I've always preferred the version my Auntie Griselda told me when she was explaining to me about puberty and all the rest. That one has them casting it together, because he wanted to make her feel just as good as she possibly could feel and he was sorry he'd not been able to do a proper job the first time. The other version seems sort of mean to men and boys. It's true I wouldn't want not to have girls to love, and it's true many boys of our age seem to be gits like Ginevra's nearest brother, but I think our Harry is more than wonderful enough to make up for all the Ronalds of the world.”

“Yes, Luna. I agree.” Hermione hugged her wife close and kissed her cheek.

“And if Father Christmas weren't sat on our Harry's other side, I might be tempted to reach down inside your clothes and do something about making you come right now, my darling. I've been curious as to what sort of beautiful noises you might make when in the throes of orgasm from almost the first moment I saw you.”

Hermione giggled. “You're a very wicked little witch, my sweet Luna.”

“Which is why I need such a strong Master and Mistress to keep me and my darling pet sister under control, my Hermione.”

Harry leant over, and his breath tickled Hermione's ear. “You're being terribly distracting, my loves. Not to mention Father Christmas can probably hear you whispering, and I get the feeling he sees you as daughters, which I'm told will mean he's trying to pretend we're going to spend our wedding night sitting in separate armchairs, drinking hot cocoa and talking about Gamp's Laws of Transfiguration. Do try to be kind to him, please.”

“Yes, Master,” Luna said. “I'll be good. In every sense of the word.”

Hermione petted Luna on the head, and turned to Harry. She couldn't resist nipping the very tip of his ear before she whispered “Yes, _Master_. All your girls will behave. For now, and until we're alone together. And then we'll still behave, but I reckon it will be a different sort of behaviour. You might even find yourself having to _tame_ us.” The little tingle of surprise, arousal, and delight she felt from him was most gratifying.

 

#

 

Ginny Weasley could scarce believe her luck. At nine o'clock on Christmas Eve she'd been tormented by the thought of how Luna might be suffering in captivity. She'd been frightened for Harry and Hermione, out there alone trying to carry on the fight against the Dark Lord without any support whilst her nearest brother, who'd become nearly as much a treasonous weasel-minded bastard as Percy, stuffed his face and complained that Hermione—loyal, lovely Hermione, who deserved so much better—was a traitor who should have come with him instead of staying with “that moody git of a Potter.”

Now, at a few minutes past midnight on Christmas Day, she had more than she'd ever dared to dream of. Not only was Luna safe and free, not only were Harry and Hermione alive and well, but Ginny was married to all three of them and they were ready to go off alone to share their wedding night. Even if the only roof over their head would be that smelly old tent Mister Perkins had lent to her father before the World Cup because he was hoping Dad would forget to give it back, it would be perfect.

Nothing could be this right. Something had to go wrong. She was just mousy little ginger-haired Ginevra Molly Weasley from Ottery Saint Catchpole, not a brilliant and gorgeous Muggleborn who would no doubt have taken up some exotic and challenging Muggle job like Spaceship Captain, Archaeologist-Adventurer, Oxbridge Lecturer, or Rock Star Film Director if she'd not been a Witch; not an amazingly talented Seer who'd published a paper in the peer-reviewed _British Journal of_ _Magizoology_ before she finished her Fifth Year at Hogwarts; not the handsome, brave, and gifted Boy Who Lived.

They were flying over a peaceful farmstead when it hit her. “Um, Father Christmas? I'm afraid you'd better take me back to my parents' house. I... I'm not yet seventeen. Luna would have gone to Hogwarts with Harry and Hermione if she'd been born a month and a half earlier, so she'll be fine, but I've still got the Trace on me. As soon as a spell gets cast near me in some place that doesn't have known adult magical residents, the Underage Sorcery Detectors will light up and we'll all be caught. You can have my wand, Luna, since the Dark Lord's people took your own. I seem to remember it worked for you and I'll be fine without. Maybe I can steal Ron's before I go back to Hogwarts, or else I'll sneak one of the spares out of the family collection.”

“Don't you even say it, Ginny Potter,” Hermione said, a hint of a lion's roar in her voice. “You're ours, and we're keeping you. We married you. We'll find a way. Harry and I know how to live Muggle, and we'll help you and Luna. We'll find a place where we can go to ground until your birthday. It's only a few months.”

It sounded wonderful. Living Muggle might be hard, but anywhere she could be with Harry and Hermione and Luna would be perfect, especially if all they had to do was live, with no thought of fighting unless they were forced to defend themselves. But Ginny knew it was selfish of her. “Eight months, my love. Who knows what the Dark Lord could accomplish in eight months? You three go and do what you need to do. I'll be waiting for you when it's over.”

“Hermione's right. You're ours, Ginny Potter. You're _mine_. I'm Harry _Fu_ _cking_ Potter, and it's about time I started acting the part. I've fought since I was a toddler, and from now on I'm going to fight for those who belong to me, because they need me, and not because my name came out of a stupid flaming punchbowl or some drunken amulet-draped fraud spat out a prophecy that a greasy-haired git overheard and passed on to an ugly clown with no nose who thought it sounded like it might be about me. I'm fighting this war my way, with my wives by my side, and nothing in the universe will take any of you from me.”

Luna caught hold of Ginny's hand, and held it so tightly that it almost hurt. “You're ours, Ginevra. I've loved you since we were children, I've wanted you ever since the first vague stirrings of puberty hit, and now I'm married to you and to Harry and to Hermione and we will not let you go. You're my wife, you're my pet sister, and you and I belong to the most wonderful Master and Mistress on Earth or anywhere else. You're going nowhere that we don't go as well.”

“I don't want to go! But I don't want you caught by the Trace, either.” Ginny began to sob.

“Father Christmas,” Harry said, “would it be too much out of your way for you to take us to some place outside of Britain and the Ministry's detection net? I hate to impose on you, and I certainly don't want to abandon the country, but I'm a married man now and my wives must come first.”

“If that's too much trouble,” Hermione said, “could you drop us off in one of the seaport towns? If we catch a ferry to Ireland or the Isle of Man, or even the Channel Islands, we'll be outside the Ministry's reach. I've nearly seven hundred pounds in notes tucked away, and that should be more than enough to buy our passage. Once we're somewhere that has a Gringotts' branch, we'll be able to get enough money to live on, not to mention passports and such if we need them. We'll come back to fight when we're able, but if it's a choice between keeping our Ginny and letting Voldemort have Britain, our Ginny comes first.”

Father Christmas laughed, and Ginny didn't know whether she should feel hurt or not. “I'm glad you brave young people feel such loyalty for each other, but there's something you're not thinking about. Your Ministry's Trace ends as soon as the young witch or wizard is legally considered an adult, doesn't it?”

Ginny and her husband and wives looked at each other. After another moment, Hermione seemed to realise that she was the designated spokesperson. “Yes.”

“Well, most of you don't marry before you leave school, these days, even the couples whose families betrothed them before they were Sorted, so it doesn't come up very often—and in any case your teachers wouldn't want to mention it, so as not to encourage unauthorised handfastings or sneaking off to Gretna Green during the holidays—but any legitimate marriage makes legal adults of all parties to it. And your marriage, however irregular the events leading up to it, is unquestionably legitimate under both religious and magical law. Posting the banns can be dispensed with under special circumstances, and yours clearly count as such. The rings wouldn't have glowed as they did if it wasn't official.”

It took a moment for the meaning of the words to trickle through Ginny's mind. “You mean... I'm an adult? The Trace is gone?”

“It is. And even if you hadn't got married, this sleigh of mine does funny things with time. After two trips, it's very likely that your magic would have decided you'd travelled past your seventeenth birthday in any case.”

“Thank you, Father Christmas. This... this is the best Christmas ever. At least for me, in any case.”

“For me as well,” Luna said. “Being both a wife and a Christmas gift has got to be the best present anyone has ever given me.”

Hermione chuckled. “It is for me. Even Harry alone would have more than made up for never getting a pony. After all, we hadn't any real place to keep a pony, and Harry is so much easier to take care of. What's more, Harry is very good at taking care of me as well. And with the rest of you... well, it couldn't be better.”

Luna made a little whickering noise at the mention of ponies, and Ginny caught a glimpse of the images in her blonde wife's mind. _Herself_ _and Luna,_ _barefoot,_ _their hair plaited with ribbon_ _s_ _,_ _wearing nothing but_ _silver_ _collars,_ _plush horses' ears, artificial horse tails_ _attached_ _to their_ _tailbones_ _with_ _S_ _ticking_ _C_ _harms_ _,_ _and_ _minimal_ _leather_ _harnesses,_ _decked_ _with jingling bells and_ _shiny_ _horse-brasses,_ _that did nothing_ _to preserve their modesty_ _,_ _were_ _pulling a little_ _two-wheeled_ _cart_ _here and there_ _, tracing patterns in the_ _clean_ _white_ _sand of a riding ring_ _under a bright blue sky_ _. Hermione, nude but for her black velvet coachman's hat,_ _her marvellous curly chocolate-brown mane spilling loose down her back to her soft white bottom,_ _sat in the cart, guiding them with_ _words and tongue-clicks and_ _little taps of a whip that was enchanted to tickle, rather than smart, when it touched their skin. When she_ _brought_ _them to a halt, Harry was there to unharness the girls, kiss_ _and stroke them_ _, and feed them sugar cubes_ _from his fingers_ _. Hermione dismounted from the driver's seat,_ _Harry_ _popped another sugar cube in her mouth, and the four of them embraced._ Hermione, her face slightly pinker than it had been moments earlier, smiled and stroked Luna's hair.

“And it definitely is for me,” Harry said. “I used to think having an insanely powerful magical terrorist out for my blood meant my life was pretty much a hopeless wreck whether I won or lost. But now... I've got a reason to live, not just to win. Thank you, all of you.”

Father Christmas pointed ahead and to the left. “I'm thinking there's a little clearing over yonder which has the look of a nice place for you four to put up your tent. And then I'll have a look in my bag and see if I've got anything for you. Can't leave presents without a roof up, after all. It's against the rules. Granted, I make all but a few of those up as I go along, but that's one I've usually stuck with.”

“I hope you don't mind my asking,” Hermione said, “but how does that work, anyhow? I'm not complaining, of course, but... you don't really bring presents to every good boy and girl on the planet, do you? Not even to every magical one, I should think. I mean... there couldn't be a conspiracy to conceal your existence. It wouldn't work on such a vast scale. And... not everyone gets what they want. I'm not criticising you, of course. Not at all. I know that even magic beyond anything we can do can't do everything. I understand...”

Father Christmas took a long drag on his pipe, which had re-appeared in his mouth without any apparent motion on his part. He blew a series of gently glowing smoke rings which danced about each other in fractal patterns before they disappeared. “The truth is, lass, if you understand it you're ahead of me, because I fully admit I don't. For the most part, my yearly flight is more about personifying the spirit of gift-giving than it is about my giving actual gifts. Think of it as something like the Horn Dance. The men who do the dance don't go round fathering the fawns and the lambs and the calves and the foals, of course, but they represent the spirits of fertility and in a way that not even magic can fully quantify, they do something to help the process along. And even if in a given year none of them sires a child, they've still done something to support those who are mothers and fathers of the children born that year.”

“That does make a kind of sense, I suppose,” Luna said. “And it's certainly a good thing the members of the Horn Dance aren't required to do all the fathering that year. It would be bad enough for human society, but for the animals I doubt it would work at all. Even if it did, it would be horribly messy and it would raise terrible issues of consent.”

“Err, Luna, my love...” Harry said, probably noticing, as Ginny did, that Father Christmas looked as if the contents of his pipe had suddenly turned to old rubber bands or something else that tasted much more foul than tobacco was meant to taste.

Luna was too caught up in her own rhetoric to notice either Father Christmas' distress or her husband's entreaty. “Not to mention we'd all have to become vegetarians because it would mean that the pigs and the cows and the sheep and what have you would be our kin, or at least part human at any rate. For some reason I've never understood folk will often think I don't eat meat, but believe me, I'd miss my black pudding and my Lamb Madras and my steak and kidney pie, and it would be terribly sad if I couldn't give the sweet Thestrals a tasty bit of ham or beef liver when I visit them.”

“Err, that's a good point, Luna,” Ginny said.

“Thank you, Ginevra. But I suppose, Father Christmas, that the question my dear darling wonderful brilliant and utterly ravishing wife Hermione is asking, although not maybe in so many words, is why this is the first time you've visited our Harry. How many years went by when his so-called relatives gave him miserable mocking so-called presents that were worse than no gifts at all, rubbish like pocket lint and old socks and ten pence pieces that his sub-porcine lump of a cousin had put holes in using one of the drills that his miserable uncle's company makes? Wouldn't it have been appropriate for someone like you, able to defy the laws of time and space, to give him a present?”

“But he did,” Harry said.

“What?” Hermione looked even more startled than Ginny felt.

“I'd always assumed up till now that I'd dreamt it all, but I remember several Christmases when I was left alone in the cupboard and a nice old man with a beard showed up to talk with me and to give me a proper Christmas dinner. Thank you, Father Christmas, you were a life saver.”

“Thank you, Harry, thank you. I'm so terribly sorry I couldn't do more, but for all my ability to creatively manipulate or outright ignore time and space and gravity, and for all the customs I can make up as I go along, I'm bound by laws—parameters stronger than mere law, really, restrictions that there isn't a good word for in any of your languages—in some ways that your kind are not. I couldn't take you out of that horrible place. I couldn't give you any sort of physical object that would have eventually been noticed, raised questions, and either got you beaten by your so-called relatives or Obliviated by that horribly well-meaning Albus Dumbledore. I couldn't even give your vile excuse for an uncle an aneurysm. All I could do was give you a bit of Christmas cheer, heal the injuries your own magic hadn't taken care of, and see to it that the ghastly diet you were fed didn't completely stunt your growth, right up until you got old enough to suppress your belief in things like yours truly. I'm sorry I couldn't do anything more useful for you.”

“It's all right. Thank you, Father Christmas. I don't see anything to forgive, because you couldn't help it, but I forgive you all the same.” He reached out with his left arm and gave the personification of Christmastide giving a strong, manly hug about the shoulders.

“Thank you, Harry. I'm glad that point only came a few years before your Hogwarts letter.”

Ginny reached around Luna and Hermione to touch Harry's knee, just as they were touching him. _I'm glad we'll be landing soon, so we'll be able to all cluster round our husband and hug him. And as much as I like Father Christmas, and as much as I'm grateful to him for everything he's done for us, I'll be very glad when he leaves. I want to touch Harry and Hermione and_ _Luna_ _, and I want all of them to touch me._ _I want my clothes off, and I want them to be bare as well._ _We need to be together,_ _just the four of us_ _. God and Merlin alone know what the future has in store for us, but tonight should be about our marriage. Even if we don't live long, we'll live for each other, and we'll live well._

 

#

 

Luna felt as if everything around her—the sleigh, the reindeer, the trees and the water below them, the surrounding air, even the Earth and the Moon and the Stars—was buzzing with the excitement she felt. She hadn't been joking in the slightest when she said being given, along with Ginevra, to Harry and Hermione was the best Christmas present she'd ever had. _I do know that being married isn't the same thing as being a pet, the way I used to fantasise about_ _it that summer when_ _Ginevra and I were nine and I felt so alon_ _e on account_ _of Mummy having died_ _and part of Daddy having died with her_ _and Ginevra felt so alone_ _on account_ _of being the only girl in her house and_ _Ronald having decided he was too old to play with her._ _I_ _knew_ _Harry Potter was alone as well_ _on account_ _of having lost both his parents and being the Boy Who Lived_ _,_ _so it seemed as if it would be really nice if we were taken away from Ottery St. Catchpole and given to him as his pets, since we were_ _all_ _too young to marry._

_That was just about us going rambling in the wood or at the seashore with Harry, him tickling us and us tickling him and brushing each others' hair and sleeping in a warm pile and never, ever being alone again. And of course in First and Second Year Hermione joined us in my fantasies because even though I hadn't the courage to talk with them I'd seen how she looked at him and how he looked at her and I knew they'd never be happy without each other._

_But e_ _ven if this were a fantasy where I could have_ _anything_ _what_ _so_ _ever I wanted, I'd want more than that_ _alone_ _._ _I know I'll have to be every bit as much a partner to all of them as Mummy was to Daddy or Daddy was to Mummy._ _I know that even if the Potter_ _fortune_ _is as huge as some people think it is we'll still have careers and lives beyond being simply Harry Potter's wives,_ _just as he'll have a career and a life beyond simply being our husband_ _. Hermione will go on being her brilliant driven self,_ _both because that's who she wants to be and because it's who Harry wants her to be,_ _and Ginevra and I will want to be successful and capable because that's how she'll see us and how Harry will see us._ _It's really a rather delicious concept, isn't it?_

Hermione's arm was about her, and she snuggled a little closer, feeling her wife's warmth and knowing that the amazing brown-haired girl would know what she was thinking. On her other side, Ginevra snuggled against her, and Luna stroked her red-haired wife's shoulder, thinking of all the times they'd cuddled together like this before, contented in their friendship and wishing the other two could be there but never daring to hope it might actually happen. _I suppose th_ _is might explain_ _why_ _Ginevra and I_ _never became lovers, despite being the best of friends_ _and intimate in every other way_ _. We were waiting_ _until_ _our Harry and our Hermione_ _were ready for us_ _._ _For that matter, it's probably why Harry and Hermione kept_ _pretending even to themselves that_ _they were siblings, and why Ginevra and Harry never went beyond_ _simpl_ _e_ _kissing, even though_ _many_ _of the broom cupboards at Hogwarts offer more than enough room for a couple to cast a cushioning charm and a_ Lumos _, strip off, and give each other a proper inspection._

On Hermione's other side, Harry had his arm about her, holding her close, his fingertips touching Luna where Hermione held her. They felt warm even through her thick cloak and the jumper and blouse beneath it. _It would be even better against my skin, and with_ _out layers of_ _cloth_ _between me and Ginevra and Hermione, but this is perfect just as it is. Oh, how I love you, my darlings!_

Ginevra had turned inwards, towards Luna, and stuck out her leg so that her calf touched Harry's. It might have seemed little more than an effort to stretch out her muscles and make herself more comfortable on the hard wooden seat, but all of them knew better.

Luna had read about electricity, the force which Muggles used for doing so many of the things that Wizards did with magic, in books she'd found in her family's library or bought in the little shops, usually found in the low rent corners of Diagon Alley, Hogsmeade town, and the other magical shopping districts, which sometimes sold Muggle items in amongst their stock of Wizarding knick-knacks and odds and ends. She was sure she didn't know as much about it as Harry or Hermione did, but she also knew that she had far more knowledge than did Ginevra's father, to name one example. Mister Weasley couldn't even pronounce the simple five syllable Greek-derived word properly, in spite of his vast collection of plugs and bulbs and batteries. She had a basic notion of what a circuit was, and she visualised herself and her husband and wives making a great unbroken circle with a strong happy force something like electricity flowing through them.

_Ginevra is still afraid something will go wrong, because it will take her a while to accept that she truly deserves all of our love and devotion. Harry still wonders if he has to die in order to kill the Dark Lord, because poor mad Professor Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore did his level best to fill our husband with the same sense of hopeless self-sacrifice for the Greater Good that consumed him after he locked up the murderous Dark Lord that his own true love had become in the secure cell at the top of Nurmengard Prison, the same cell which Grindelwald had intended to house his own most powerful opponent. Hermione is only now beginning to give up her own obsession with self-sacrifice, but her mind's been opened up by human love and divine Grace and she's just done the one thing she spent years convincing herself would never ever happen because she didn't think she was good enough for the man she loved and she barely dared admit even in the privacy of her thoughts that she wanted the two of us as well. And me... well, I've issues enough of my very own, but I know in my bones that this is right and the four of us will never be apart again._

Luna reached out with her mind and did her best to let her loves feel her love for them. She felt their love reaching out for her, entwining with hers and each others' until all the beautiful colours that represented them in her mind—the green of Harry's eyes, the warm brown of Ginevra's, the soft cinnamon of Hermione's, and the grey of her own—blended into one amazing shade that words couldn't begin to describe. It was nothing like the muddy colour that would have resulted if she'd mixed green and grey paint with two shades of brown, and the individual hues retained their own identity even as they melted together.

Father Christmas made a tongue click and called out a few words in a language Luna didn't know. _Some people might have said it was Gobbledegook, I imagine, but that would be silly, because other than a slight similarity in the vowel sounds and some of the fricatives it doesn't sound very much like Gruagais at all, even aside from the fact that I understand Gruagais fairly well and I couldn't follow that at all._ In any case, the reindeer clearly understood him, which was what counted. The sleigh began to descend towards a clearing in the wood.

It was time to land, time to put up the tent Harry and Hermione had been sharing, the tent which was now their first home as a family. It was time to enjoy their first Christmas together and, last but not least, their wedding night. Luna was looking forward to every bit of it, even the awkward parts. _I do have to believe something will be awkward, whether it's conjuring up a Yule Goat instead of a Christmas tree or Harry forgetting to put down the toilet seat. Not that I necessarily think he'll do that, but I'm told it's traditional for newly-wed husbands, so perhaps he should do it once in order to placate the mysterious spirits of matrimony?_

_Or maybe the awkward part will be something to do with sex? That wouldn't be so bad, because it could end up rather giggly and tender and I imagine it could turn into a very sweet and lovely memory later on. Or even sooner, with luck._

 

#

 

The sleigh came to rest in a little clearing. Harry felt an overwhelming sense of joy and peace and a soft longing that was tinged with the certainty of coming satisfaction. He didn't know if it came from his wives, from within him, or from both, and he didn't really care. It belonged to all of them, and that was what mattered.

He looked around them. Had he been here before? He knew he hadn't, but there was something familiar about this place... With a start, he realised he was sharing Hermione's thoughts and feelings, and seeing the clearing with its dusting of snow and the little frozen pond at its edge through her eyes as much as his own.

She grasped his arm and slid her grip down until she found his hand and their fingers intertwined. “Oh, Harry! It's the Forest of Dean. I came here on a camping holiday with my parents in the summer before we started Hogwarts, and it was brilliant. I've wanted to show you this very spot for years and years, my love, practically ever since we became friends.”

“Really?”

“Yes, my silly wonderful boy! Or maybe I should I call you my silly wonderful man? Almost every night in the summer after First Year, I lulled myself to sleep, alone in my little bed with only my pillow to hug, imagining how our lives would be if you and I had left Kings' Cross Station together and come straight here, with just Hedwig and a nice tent for us to sleep in.”

“That sounds nice.”

“It was. Sometimes I pretended we came here with my parents instead, but that was never quite as much fun because although I managed to make myself believe that in my fantasy world they would let us share a tent of our own and they wouldn't ask if we were using separate sleeping bags, I knew we'd have to wear costumes in the pond. Even fantasy has its limits, and of course my Dad would have been even more mortified at seeing me going for a bathe in the nude, most especially if I were bathing with my wonderful boy, than I would have been mortified at being seen by him. It's true my parents lived in a teepee on a commune one summer when they were at university, but they're certainly not nudists.”

If he'd not been able to feel Hermione's emotions, he might have had trouble believing she'd really had those feelings for him all the way back then, back when he'd been trying to understand the funny way she made him feel, before he decided it had to be simple friendship or something like being brother and sister, because he'd seen boyfriends and girlfriends amongst the upper years breaking up but brothers and sisters never did and he didn't dare risk losing his Hermione. But he could feel them, and he did believe. He couldn't find the words to express how happy it made him, but he held her close and he let his own feelings flow into her. She sighed and snuggled closer, and he felt Luna snuggling against her and Ginny snuggling against Luna as clearly as if their bodies had been directly pressed into his own.

“Oh, that sounds so very perfect,” Luna whispered. “Imagine if you'd found two cute little lost girls from Ottery St. Catchpole who'd been transported here because of accidental magic and didn't know how to get home...”

Hermione purred. There was no other word for the sound she made. “Oh, love, it would have been brilliant! And if only we'd already met the two of you, my fantasies would have gone just about like that. Mm...” Suddenly he could see the images in her head, as clearly as if he were imagining them for himself. They were a bit fuzzy on some details, in keeping with the fantasies of a shy young girl, even with Ginny and Luna being added in by her present-day mind, but of course it wouldn't have been right for their eleven and twelve year old selves to do much more than hug, kiss, snuggle, and tickle each other. In any case, they were Hermione's fantasies and he felt privileged to share in them.

One morning, a few days after they'd left the station and come to stay in the forest, young Harry and Hermione woke up in each others' arms. As they always did, they kissed and talked about their dreams for a few minutes before they got out of their sleeping bag and set about making breakfast in the soft light slanting through the trees. However, this morning was different to the previous ones, because there was a popping sound and two slightly younger witches, a redhead and a blonde, appeared in their camp site.

They were upset at first because they didn't know why they'd suddenly been transported from the garden of Luna's father's house by the River Otter to an unfamiliar clearing in the forest, but Harry and Hermione hugged them and dried their tears and shared their breakfast. After an hour or two Ginny and Luna were certain it was actually a good thing, because it was so nice to have two wonderful new friends. They didn't know how to get home, but there was plenty of room for four children to sleep in the tent if they didn't mind touching, which of course none of them did, so they moved in and within no time at all it was as if they'd known each other for years, even though they never for a moment deluded themselves into thinking they were siblings.

Harry and Hermione quickly realised that Ginny was Ron's sister, but they were disappointed to learn that their friend from Hogwarts was sometimes not very nice to his adorable little sibling and her clever, pretty best friend. Although they would remain friends with Ron, they knew that their girls would be their dearest companions and their first priority from now on. They sent Hedwig with letters so Luna's father and Ginny's parents could know their daughters were all right, but wanted to stay with their friends for the summer. Fortunately, they were just as pleased to allow Ginny and Luna to camp in the forest with Harry Potter and his Hermione as Hermione's parents had been pleased to let her stay with Harry. Mrs Weasley sent shortbread, and Mister Lovegood sent a camera and film, requesting that they try for a photograph if they should see either a Crumple-horned Snorkack or a Brattleford's Lesser Flyweasel.

The four happy young people lived quietly all summer long, splashing and playing in the pond, rambling through the forest and watching the birds and the animals, exploring ancient stone circles and mediaeval ruins, lying in a pile on a blanket in the sunshine to read their books, teaching each other all the things they knew, and never being disturbed by adults of any sort. They exchanged kisses every night before they cuddled together to sleep, and every morning whoever woke first would rouse the others with more kisses.

They ate simple delicious meals, including plenty of fresh vegetables because Hermione knew those were very important for good health, which they cooked over the camp fire or in the hot ashes just as the people in books about historical adventures in the outdoors always did. When the full moon was up they danced on a hilltop and the little glowing fairies circled round them. And of course they always cleaned their teeth.

When the owl from Hogwarts showed up one afternoon, there was a single letter addressed to “Harry and Hermione Potter, their Ginny, and their Luna.” In a personal note, Professor McGonagall congratulated the foursome and told them they'd have a room of their own in Gryffindor Tower. Ginny asked if this meant she and Luna had become their pets, and Luna said she hoped they were pets, because it sounded perfect. Harry and Hermione looked into each others' eyes for a long silent moment, and each nodded agreement. Hermione said they would buy their girls the very nicest collars they could find in Diagon Alley, and Harry reminded them that they would still have to wear clothes at school and when they were shopping. Luna pretended to be disappointed, but they all knew she was only playing, because going completely bare was something special that was only for when the four of them were all alone together.

“I hope you don't mind all the, err, well, the nudity,” Hermione whispered, “but I was really kind of curious, and... oh, it just sounded nice. I know we were only twelve... well, I was twelve, and you three are younger than me. I don't mean to be such a pervert.”

Harry hugged her closer. “You're not a pervert, love. Or at least you're not a worse one than I am. I was curious as well. On those same nights when you were lying in bed thinking about us bathing together in the pond wearing nothing at all, I was lying in bed thinking about how warm and soft you felt when we hugged and trying to imagine what you would look like without your clothes on.”

Luna put her arms about them both. “Even before the first time I saw your face, Harry, I had all sorts of fantasies about Ginevra and me going for a bathe with the Boy Who Lived. And you were added to them from the first morning I watched you at breakfast with him, Hermione, because I could tell that the two of you needed each other in order to be happy. Not to mention that you're gorgeous and I'd probably have wanted you even if you didn't come as a set with our wonderful Harry.”

Ginny hugged her husband and wives. “And don't forget that we didn't have swimming costumes, my loves. I'd never even seen one until the Second Task of the Triwizard Tournament when Luna and I were in the stands watching and I saw what Harry and Fleur—and Krum and Cedric as well, of course—were wearing. I reckon Mum thinks they're a waste of money.”

“And my family have always thought they were unhealthy, ever since the days of bathing machines and wool boiler suits and long dresses with little weights in the hems. I'd wear a costume if it were the only way we could go for a bathe, say if we had no option but a beach or a pool where other people were, but I'd really prefer to go without one.” Even in the dark, he could feel Luna's little grin.

_Oh, so that's why a beach photograph would embarrass Father Christmas. Speaking of whom, he's got down from the sleigh, hasn't he?_ Harry would have felt embarrassed, but he was too caught up in his wives to care. Their shared memory of Hermione's fantasy felt as if it might have taken hours, but he knew somehow that it had only been a few minutes since they landed.

“Come along, my loves,” Ginny said, “the sooner we've got the tent up, the sooner we can have our wedding night!”

“Good point, Ginevra,” Luna said, giving her a little kiss. “And that's probably the most kissing we should do until our friend is safely away.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Potter. That's very kind of you.” Father Christmas was checking the harness of his reindeer. Harry wondered if the straps and buckles actually needed inspection or if checking them was simply his way of giving the foursome a bit of privacy.

“I think it's his way of ignoring our sappy newly-wed antics, actually,” Hermione whispered as he helped her down. “In which case it would be rude not to take just a little advantage, don't you agree, my husband?”

“Yes.” They kissed, and he held her for a moment before she stepped away so he could help Luna down and give her a kiss of her own. He did the same for Ginny, and noticed as he did so that Luna had Hermione pressed up against the side of the sleigh, kissing her. He was amused to see that, even though the little blonde was barely five foot two and Hermione was five foot six, the same height as Harry himself, Luna seemed well able to manhandle her senior wife.

_Then again, Hermione likes it that way. It might seem a bit at odds with all of Luna's talk about submitting to her Mistress, but it makes them both happy, and therefore it makes me and Ginny happy as well._ Ginny put her arm about him and they stood together watching their wives at play. She leant her head against his cheek and he reflected on how much he'd missed the scent of her hair.

A moment later they were enveloped in the arms of their two loving wives. “It's not at odds at all, my dearest husband and Master. I'm simply proving to our Hermione that I'm a fierce wild Luna who wants taming. Something which I'm sure both of you will be happy to provide to me and our equally fierce Ginevra.”

“Rarr! Yes, I'm very fierce and bold, aren't I? Don't you see my fangs? I'm ferocious, I tell you. I might even bite your earlobes. At least if you like that sort of thing.”

Hermione nuzzled her. “Of course, my love. We all know what they say about ginger girls, don't we, Harry?”

He kissed her on the cheek. “I reckon we do, but I think we could use a bit of a refresher course taught by an expert, wouldn't you agree, my wife?”

Ginny nuzzled both of them. “Well, people will tell you we're wild and feral and difficult to control, and they always mention our legendary terrible tempers, but I think you'll discover that we're easily tamed by the right people, and we like nothing better than to lie about being fed sweets and having our bellies rubbed. Not to mention other soft and tender parts of us as well.”

Luna nipped at Ginny's ear. “Should you be telling them that, dear Ginevra? Isn't it out of character for such a fierce predator of Chocolate Frogs, the legendary _Ginevra rufa,_ also known for her habit of jumping on Harries and Hermiones and Lunas before assailing them with scores of savage kisses and absolutely barbaric hugs and caresses, to admit she's really cuddly and sweet and gentle?”

“I think we might have already worked it out for ourselves, so I reckon she's not giving any real secrets away.” Hermione said. “Now let's us thank the reindeer, and then we'll go and set up our tent so Father Christmas can be about his business and we can play show and tell with each other.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have another chapter of this written, and am currently writing the fourth one. I don't dare say if it will be a four or a five chapter story, but it should at least have a definite ending. The explicit bits are in the next two chapters.
> 
> I usually find the whole ponygirl thing rather squicky, but Luna has a way of making everything cute and cuddly and adorable.
> 
> I've got a bad feeling some people out there will complain about the idea of Harry, Hermione, Ginny, and Luna, having had such vivid sexual fantasies in their First and Second Years at Hogwarts, but their fantasies are very much equivalent to the fantasies I had at that age and I sincerely doubt I'm the only one.


	3. In Which a House is Warmed, Fragments of T.M. Riddle are Sent to Purgatory, and Hermione Potter is Undressed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pretty much what the title says. Here is where the fic begins to earn the M rating.

It seemed as if it had been months or even years since the last time Hermione had set up camp. That had been yesterday evening when she'd still been devastated over Ron leaving, and terribly confused and uncertain at finding herself alone with Harry, despite, or perhaps because of, how much it resembled some of her most secret fantasies. She'd had to tell herself over and over, night after night, not to crawl into bed with him, because even simple fully-clothed snuggling would only be her taking advantage of her very best friend. She knew she couldn't do that, and she was certain that if she did she'd only lose him just the way she'd lost the red-headed boy to whom she'd always be grateful, despite how annoying he could be, for taunting her until she hid in the girls' toilets to cry so the Boy Who Lived could come and save her from a troll, just the way he always saved young girls in those silly novels Lavender had lent her because she saw how much Hermione liked books and she knew her Muggleborn room-mate would love them just as much as she did.

She hadn't wanted to admit it, but she had actually enjoyed those ridiculous stories. There was an endearing quality to them, even though the character that had the same name as her Harry was nothing like the quiet, guarded boy who became her friend, the boy who never talked about his home life, the boy who always flinched away from physical contact until finally she hugged him as he went off to face the Dark Lord's puppet and he clung to her as tenderly as she'd been dreaming of him doing ever since the night he rescued her.

“Friendship, bravery, and _love_. I nearly told said it right then and there, Harry. If my courage hadn't failed at the very last moment, I would have told you I loved you. I'm sorry I didn't.” she whispered, and he folded his arms about her from behind as their wives embraced them both from the sides.

“You did tell me, my heart. You didn't use those exact words, but you told me you loved me. I'm sorry it took me so many years to figure out I should say 'I love you as well, Hermione.' I'll do everything I can to make it up to you.”

She squeezed his joined hands to her bosom. “We're a family, my love. You married me and our Ginny and our Luna, and from now on there can't be any debts between us.”

“Let's put up the security charms, my loves,” Luna said. “We can talk more when we have a tent over us, our company's away, and we need have no fear of annoying strangers stopping by to interrupt our fun.”

Ginny touched her finger to the tip of Luna's nose. “Don't forget annoying family, my sweet. It would be a bit unfortunate if my stupid brother showed up to tell us he was sorry and he wanted to take up with Dumbledore's stupid plan again, wouldn't it be?”

Luna rubbed her nose against Ginny's finger. “It would be. We can spend Christmas, or at least Boxing Day, with family next year, but tonight's our wedding night. I'd feel guilty for wanting to do something violent to Ronald on the feast of Our Saviour's birth. And actually doing it would definitely mean having to go to Confession, which is something I've never enjoyed. I suppose it's possible that I'd get a priest who'd tell me to simply give my wives and husband kisses and a foot massage, but I rather doubt the appropriate penance for making a eunuch of one's brother-in-law would be so pleasant, even if the missing parts returned within a fortnight or five.”

Ginny smiled sweetly. “I'd be very tempted to do something violent to Ron, myself. I've spent a lot of time thinking since I got home and found him there, and I've been wondering if some idiot might have told him picking fights was how Muggles showed affection. And when I asked him what had happened to his 'best mates,' he said our Hermione was a traitor who should have come along with him instead of staying with her true best friend who needed her. I've a bad feeling that if he does show up he'll imagine he only needs to tell her he forgives her in order to have her melt and spread her legs for him. If he does, and if he tries anything like that, please do stop me before I actually kill him, my loves. It would make my parents sad if I did, however much he might deserve it for being so rude to my darling wife.”

Hermione pretended to retch. It might have been a childish way of expressing her emotions, the sort of thing serious grown-up First Year Hermione would never have done where anyone else, even her Harry, could see and hear, but it was a very accurate summation of how she really felt about the idea of Ron as anything other than her brother-in-law. Not to mention it made her heart feel warm to know she could let herself be a little childish in front of her dear husband and wives. “I'll admit I was trying to force myself to fall for your brother, because it seemed the best way of staying close to Harry without trying to take him away from you, but do you really think he's that stupid?”

“I'd like to think it's not nearly as conscious as all that, but I wonder. Fred and George gave him this stupid joke book called _Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches_ , and I've a bad feeling he actually believed it was a serious guide to mastery in the art of seduction.”

Harry snorted. “Even I knew better than to fall for that thing. Sometimes I wonder if Ron ever entirely recovered from when those blasted brains in the Department of Mystery got hold of him.” Hermione could hear the sudden burst of sadness in his voice. “I'm sorry for that. I suppose I did lead him there.”

“To be honest,” Ginny said, “I think something happened long before. I love my mother, and I know she'd never do anything to deliberately hurt any of us, but I've wondered if she might have given him some tonic that did more harm than good.”

Hermione was shocked. Mrs Weasley had always seemed so very careful of her children. _And of every other young person as well. L_ _ooking back, she might have even_ _been trying_ _to steer me towards Harry and away from Ron._ _Could she have known that our Ginny would_ _be happy to share_ _, or did she simply see how terribly wrong her son and I would be together?_ She let the speculation fall aside, and made a little sympathetic noise in the back of her throat.

Ginny smiled and gave her a soft small kiss. “I know a toddler's memories aren't exactly reliable, but I could swear I remember Mum and Dad and the other grown-ups being upset when Ron and I were very little because I was talking in sentences before he was, in spite of being seventeen months younger. I can just imagine everyone from Aunt Muriel to our distant cousins who live in those little Unplottable villages off in the fens where they speak Middle English and make their own wands sending bottles and sachets and charms that were meant to put him right. One of those might have knocked him all askew in his head, even if it did fix the talking thing.”

Hermione stroked the back of Harry's hand, that being the part of him she could most easily reach. “And even if it was the brains, my love, it was a risk all of us who went to the Ministry chose to take, and would take again. Blame the Dark Lord and his lackeys, not yourself. Now let me go for a minute and let's us set up camp, please, my heart. Once we've a roof over our heads, we can hold each other all night.”

He pressed a little kiss behind her ear and did. Within minutes, the tent was standing and they had a set of security charms in place that even the late Alastor Moody would have considered barely adequate. _God rest your_ _valiant_ _soul, Master Auror, and_ _now I_ _think that might be more than just a_ _n empty_ _platitude when I say it._

Father Christmas came walking over, brushing his hands clean of the grain dust that had got on them when he gave his reindeer their nosebags. “Nicely done, Mr. and Mrs. Potter. Even I might have had a little trouble finding this camp of yours if I didn't know it was here.”

“Thank you, Father Christmas.” Hermione knew she was blushing as badly as she'd done when she was a First Year and Professor Flitwick praised her Charms work. _But this time Ron isn't here to say I'm a nightmare, and I'm not going to go and cry in the toilets,_ _I'm going to celebrate Christmas and our wedding night with my loves_ _._

“It's only the truth. So, if you'll go inside? I think I can dispense with the whole rooftop and fireplace business, but it does seem more appropriate if the family go into their house first.”

Just before Harry and Hermione walked in the door, Luna stopped them. “Pick her up, Husband, please.”

“May I, Hermione?”

She looked into his eyes. “Of course, my love. There's a place for tradition. Some of my aunties might say I was being shamefully submissive to a man and betraying the rights their generation fought for, but that's absolute rubbish. I choose this.” He gathered her into his arms, and she wrapped hers about his shoulders. She fit perfectly, and for a moment she imagined herself as small as their Luna, even though she and Harry were exactly the same height.

Ginny picked up Luna and carried her in after them. “There, that's done.”

“We can try out all the other variations on carrying each other over the threshold over the next few days,” Luna said. “But for now, let's get on with the festivities. May I borrow your wand, please, Ginevra, my dear wife?”

“Of course you may, my sweet wife Luna.” Ginny drew her wand and gave it to Luna, and Hermione felt a lovely little tingle in her own hand when the girls' fingers contacted each other in the process.

“Thank you, Ginevra. That feels _pleasant_.”

Hermione shivered with the shared pleasure. _It's very nearly orgasmic, that's what it is. I wonder what it would feel like to have one of them try_ my _wand?_

Luna winked at her, and cast a spell that she silently promised to teach to her wives and husband later on. A Christmas tree appeared in one corner of the tent's main room. It was ornamented with strings of tinsel and little straw figures; the angel at the top reminded Hermione of a winged Professor McGonagall, although the resemblance might have been mostly the bagpipes and the tartan robes. The branches were dusted with tiny twinkling lights that looked more like _Lumos_ spells cast by wands the size of matchsticks than they did either candles or bulbs.

“Oh, Luna, it's brilliant! Thank you!” Harry wrapped Luna up in his arms, his eyes lit up with almost childlike delight. If Hermione hadn't already been in love with Luna she would have fallen head over heels for the sweet little blonde right then and there, simply for making her Harry so happy.

She reached out and give Luna a soft pat on the head. “That's a beautiful tree, darling.”

Ginny put a hand on Luna's shoulder. “It's wonderful, love. Well done.”

“Thank you, my loves. I'm just glad I got it right on the first go. You see, the incantation is only a couple of syllables away from the one that conjures up a Yule Goat instead. Those can be cute, but they tend to chew on the furniture, and sometimes they're not properly house-broken, which can get messy. There's another spell which is slightly more reliable, but no sensible person uses that one except possibly in an institutional setting, because when it _does_ go wrong you get either a _Jólakötturinn,_ an Icelandic Yule Cat—it's a falsehood that they eat people, but they go through your closet and if your clothes aren't sufficiently up to date for their tastes they'll remain in your kitchen begging for sandwiches, eggnog, and Christmas pudding until Twelfth Night, and there's no banishing them—or a _Gloso_. That's a Swedish Christmas Sow which breathes fire, and they usually drink up all the mulled wine in the house before they leave. Oh, and you can come in now, Father Christmas, we've put the tree up.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Potter.” He stepped into the tent. “A very happy Christmas to all!”

“Happy Christmas, Father Christmas!”

Harry went over into the kitchen nook and put the kettle on. “The milk's been under stasis, and it should be all right. Would you like a glass of it, Father Christmas? I understand biscuits are customary as well, but it doesn't look as if we've got any in the pantry at the moment.”

“I'd be grateful for one, Mister Potter. But now that you mention it...” Father Christmas made a complex gesture, and everything around them changed. It was still their tent. Luna's Christmas tree stood unchanged in the spot where it had been. The floor plan and the positioning of the chairs and the sofa were the same. But the lingering smell of too many cats was gone, and everything was quietly comfortable and well kept, rather than shabby and slightly tasteless as it was before. The walls were lined with bookshelves, and in the spaces where there weren't bookshelves lovely oil paintings and watercolours were hung. The little iron stove was rather larger now, and made of blue and white ceramic tiles, much like an eighteenth century Dutch stove that Hermione had once admired in a museum. The air was warm enough that she would have felt perfectly comfortable without her woollen jumper.

The kitchen now had a beautiful cooker and a sizeable refrigerator, as well as plenty of pantry space and a generous stretch of counter. In place of the multiple bunks, there was one massive bed. And the little curtained-off nook which had held an old tin hip bath was replaced with a gigantic cedar wood tub, more than big enough for the four of them to use it at once. _It might be awkward to have guests_ _overnight_ _,_ Hermione thought, _since there aren't any dividers to give us privacy from them or them privacy from us, but for a married foursome this is simply perfect._ _We could just stay here and grow old together, couldn't we?_ _Well, maybe_ _we'd_ _not_ _want to do_ _that, but we could_ _easily_ _live_ _in this tent_ _until we had kids_ _who were big enough to_ _need_ _their own rooms_ _._ “Thank you, Father Christmas, this is incredible. Thank you so very much!”

“It's my great pleasure, Mrs. Potter.”

Harry came over with a pot of tea, a pitcher, a sugar bowl, a glass of milk, and a plate of assorted biscuits. “Thank you so very much, Father Christmas. Will you join us for a snack before you go?”

“I'd be delighted to.” He sat down in the armchair opposite the sofa and took a biscuit.

“You'll go in the middle, Harry,” Luna said, “with Ginevra and me on either side, and our Hermione in your lap.”

Hermione felt both pleasure and guilt. “I don't have to... I mean, I'm the same height as you, Harry. I must be a bit much to have sitting on your knees...”

“Not at all,” Harry said. “You'll be grand.” She could feel a wave of warm reassurance from Luna and Ginny flowing over her. It did feel awfully nice to sit in Harry's lap, and she could sense that he wasn't at all uncomfortable, which allowed her to relax. She couldn't resist wriggling her bottom, just enough to enjoy his reaction to her closeness, even though they did have Father Christmas as their guest sitting on the opposite side of the little low table. Harry buried his nose in her hair and drew in a deep breath, and she knew he didn't mind her gentle teasing at all. Very much the contrary, in fact.

There was a quiet moment whilst they poured tea and munched biscuits. _I'd like to feed my husband and wives and for them to feed me, but_ _that had better wait till we're alone. It could be difficult to stop it turning into_ _something that would embarrass our guest._

It was enough to hand Harry the cup that Ginny had poured for him, and to take her own from Luna, which had no sugar and the perfect amount of milk, just as she would have made it for herself. Luna's own cup of tea had no milk and so much sugar that Hermione suspected her wife was using magic to stop it falling out of suspension, but the warm little trickle of her darling blonde's enjoyment wiped away whatever disgust she might have felt at the concept. Luna had hardly been given anything sweet when she was a prisoner in Malfoy Manor, and if comforting her meant putting beefsteak with caramel and a strawberry reduction sauce on the menu Hermione would happily go in the kitchen and make it. Or at least she'd help Harry in whatever way she could, since she'd never cooked a steak before and she wanted Luna to have the very best steak she could have.

Luna sent out a wave of love that made Hermione wish the four of them were alone and preferably unclothed. “Thank you, my darlings. Isn't it delightful that we're getting each others' pleasure at tastes more than we're getting the tastes themselves?”

Ginny laughed. “Yes. Mum tells me she and Dad had to eat everything in synchronised bites for more than a year after their wedding. It faded eventually, which Mum says was a good thing cos Dad likes his ploughman's lunch and she doesn't much care for the pickle, but if you watch them having a meal together you'll see they usually act as if it hasn't.”

“Well, now you're comfortable,” Father Christmas said, “I reckon it's time for me to give you your presents and be on my way.”

Hermione was flabbergasted, and she could hardly think of what to say. “Err, thank you, Father Christmas, but... you've brought us together, and you've fixed up the tent for us, and...”

“Thank you very much, Father Christmas,” Luna said, “but you've already given me the most wonderful Christmas gift I could ever have.”

“I wouldn't want to be greedy,” Ginny said. “You rescued our Luna, you brought the two of us to our Harry and our Hermione, and you witnessed our wedding. There's nothing else I could want.”

“My wives speak for me,” Harry said, his breath stirring Hermione's hair.

“Ah, well, I'm touched by your selflessness, my dear children, but it happens there are a few things in my sack that you'll need. More than that, I'd say they're meant for you.” He reached into the bag and pulled out a number of objects: a golden cup embossed with badgers, a rather peculiar-looking metal headdress that Hermione thought she recognised from an old engraving of Rowena Ravenclaw, and a sword with a silver hilt set with garnets, which reminded her of the Viking swords in the British Museum except this one had been cleaned and oiled regularly instead of being buried in the ground somewhere for a thousand years. She remembered once seeing that sword in the hands of a twelve-year old Harry, or had she handled it herself? _No, wait. Those are Harry's memories. It's the Sword of Gryffindor!_

Luna shivered. “That has the look of Ravenclaw's Diadem, which has been lost for an age, and the goblet might well be Hufflepuff's Cup, but they feel _very_ Dark now, Father Christmas.” Her voice quivered in a way that it never had done when she was a fifteen year old fighting for her life and those of her friends in the Ministry Building.

“Like the Diary...” Ginny murmured.

“Well spotted, my dear girls. My bag is capable of neutralising a Horcrux for safe travel, but this sword is one of the better means of destroying the nasty things. There was a plan for you to get it in another fashion, but I have to say I think Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape were smoking too much hemp mixed with opium and toad venom when they made it up, so I took the liberty of bringing the weapon straight to your hands.”

“Thank you so much,” Harry said.

“It seemed only appropriate, considering it's your own property. Some Goblin Fundamentalists might disagree, but any normal Goblin would say your ancestor bought it fairly and all you need do is pray for the resting of the maker's soul and pour a glass of ale for him on All Hallows Eve, just as they themselves will do for those who made their own family heirlooms.”

For a moment Hermione could scarcely think of anything except how very irritated she was with Professor Binns over how many basic facts about Goblin culture Father Christmas had just revealed in a single sentence, not a single one of which she'd learnt in five years studying History of Magic at Hogwarts. _Really, would it have killed—or_ _should I say_ _exorcised?—him to_ _take_ _a few minutes_ _out of_ _his_ _endless droning_ _on_ _about Goblin rebellions and_ _tell us_ _they have factions defined by ideological and-slash-or religious disagreements_ _which include different opinions on_ _inheritance laws and concepts of ownership? That they pray_ _for their dead_ _and make offerings? That they observe some of the same festivals as we do, apparently using the same calendar, which_ _suggests_ _that_ _at least_ _some_ _Goblins_ _practice_ _a form of_ _Christianity, or_ _I suppose it_ _'s possible it_ _might be_ _a_ _faith_ _related to one of the old Pagan_ _religions_ _?_ _Did it never occur to him that_ _the reasons_ _why people, Goblins included, did things_ _are_ _just_ _as important as_ _the things_ _they did?_ _How dare_ _he_ _claim the title of historian?_ With effort, and the calm loving acceptance of her husband and wives, she pushed her fury at the pedantic spectre aside. “Thank you, Father Christmas.”

“Ah, it's nothing, Mrs Hermione Potter. You four deserve a proper honeymoon, and you'll not be able to have one until poor mad Tom Marvolo Riddle has been sent on his way to Purgatory. I wish I didn't have to ask you to take a few minutes out of your wedding night for business, but I think you'll find it worth your while.”

“Should we do this outside?” Harry said.

“Actually, my dear husband, I think a domestic setting would be ideal for eliminating them.” Luna's voice was steady again. “The Dark Lord despises not just marriage, not just sexuality, but the very concepts of family and love. It would be justice for his soul jars to be sent off to judgement in the same place where the new family who will end them will begin their life together.”

Father Christmas tipped his hat to her. “That's very well said, Mrs Luna Potter.”

They laid the objects on the table and stood up. Before Harry could move the tea tray, it popped away to the kitchen. “Good evening, Master Harry Potter Sir and Mistress Miney, Mistress Moon, and Mistress Ginevery. Dobby is congratulating you on your bonding, and Dobby is here to be serving in whatever capacity the House of Potter will be having him.”

A sudden flood of information burst into Hermione's mind, and in an instant she knew far more of House Elves than she'd learnt from all the hours of research she'd done in Fourth Year. “Thank you, Luna. I wish I'd had the sense to ask you back then, my love. And I'm sorry, Dobby, I never understood that your people needed to bond with Wizards and Witches in order to remain in good health. I should have asked, instead of just assuming I knew what was best for people of another species because Mum and Dad and all my books said human beings should be free and independent and anything that looked even remotely like slavery had to be evil. Welcome to the family.”

“You is always only meaning well, Mistress Miney. Dobby is thanking you for your caring, and Dobby is being very glad to be calling you and your sisters-wives his mistresses.” He bowed to her, and then he seemed to realise there was someone sitting in the armchair. He spun about, dropped to both knees facing Father Christmas, and kowtowed. Hermione had never seen such a gesture outside of a film or the illustrations in a book. Dobby waited ten seconds, rose to his knees, and began to speak in a language she'd never heard before. She wondered if this might be his native tongue, or possibly that of all House Elves. _It never occurred to me that they might have a language or languages of their own, but it would explain Dobby's grammar, wouldn't it? Periphrastic verb constructions,_ _and_ _something like a present continuous tense that gets used_ _in_ _most contexts_ _where English_ _ha_ _s_ _got_ _the simple present_ _..._ _I wonder what the word order is like?_ Very gently, Harry's thoughts reminded her that she might want to concentrate on what was happening right now, and that Dobby would very likely be glad to talk about his language with her later on. She squeezed her husband's hand and thought a warm pulse of appreciation at him.

Father Christmas addressed Dobby in the same language, and then reached down and raised the elf to his feet, switching to English “Come, my friend, get you up. You know your master and mistresses don't care for such displays, and why should I be any different?”

“You is being the Earthly Lord of House Elves, my Lord Baron of Christmastide. But I am hearing and obeying.”

“Well met, you good and faithful Elf. It's well that you should witness the destruction of this great evil. And would you be so kind as to bring your chosen mate to join us? Not to mention that the last Elf of Black should be here as well.”

Kreacher popped into the room and abased himself before Father Christmas as Dobby had done. The conversation in that other language went on somewhat longer, and at the end of it the battered old Elf in his filthy pillowcase seemed suddenly younger and much cleaner and healthier. “Kreacher is being glad to be seeing Master Regulus' last order carried out.”

“Take off the locket, Harry,” Hermione said. “It's time we put an end to this thing.”

He laid it on the table and she wrapped an arm about him. “Draw your sword and strike, my husband.”

“Actually, I think my brave wife, who has worn this bit of evil jewellery herself, should do the job.”

“Me, Harry? But... I'm not the hero. I'm only—mmph!” He stopped her mouth with a kiss, and when he was done Ginny and Luna were lined up to kiss her as well.

“You're my heroine, Hermione,” he said softly, stroking her hair. “More than that, you're _our_ heroine.” With his other hand, he pressed the sword into her hand.

A kitchen knife was the closest thing to an edged weapon she'd held in all her life up until that moment, unless one counted the foils from the three week course of introductory fencing lessons she'd finished a few days before an owl dropped a letter in her lap and Professor McGonagall showed up to prove it wasn't a prank by turning herself into a cat and the teapot into a lobster, but the Sword of Gryffindor felt as natural in her grip as her very own vinewood and dragon heartstring wand. _It's heavier than a foil, but not as much as I would have thought. Well,_ _so much for all those silly fantasy books and historical novels where the swords supposedly weighed ten or twenty pounds. I suppose this is proof the authors never bothered to try picking up a proper one, isn't it_ _?_

Harry hissed “Open!” in Parseltongue, which she hadn't expected to understand, and the lid of the locket rose of its own accord. She watched in fascination as a cloud of smoke welled up and images played on it: Harry and Ginny, in bed, alone, making love. Perhaps they might play around with someone as pretty as Luna now and again, just for a bit of a change from their monogamous marriage, but they'd never need a bossy bookworm. She might as well be with thoughtless, casually misogynistic Ron, someone else who didn't deserve better...

All her fears evaporated like drops of water on a hot skillet as the very real Harry and the very real Ginny and the very real Luna embraced her, warming her with their presence, letting their love flow into her mind and spirit.

“We love you and we need you, my darling wife,” Ginny whispered. “Even when I was a silly little Second Year making up fantasies about being fully claimed by the boy who'd saved her from a basilisk, the girl whom he'd saved from a troll was always there in bed with us where she belonged. And those ridiculous udders aren't even remotely like my breasts. I love you, Hermione. Riddle is a cretin.”

“Not to mention he has terrible taste. Ginevra's real breasts are much more shapely, as you'll soon see for yourself, and that bed looks utterly wrong without a Hermione in it. I adore you, my treasure, my sweet wife. We all do.”

Harry's breath tickled her ear. “I've wanted to make love to you since I was a spotty little boy whose voice broke at the drop of a hat, Hermione. Ginny and I waited even to touch each other below the neckline because on some level we knew it wasn't right without you there to share it there with us. That picture is nothing but rubbish from a sorry excuse for a Dark Lord who can't even make up a good anagram. I love you.”

She bared her teeth and extended the sword into the locket. She felt a whisper of embarrassment, doubting that her unschooled poking would do more than scratch the Horcrux, but the tip seemed to sink in and through as if the cursed object were made of butter, not metal. There was a fading scream, and the evil presence was gone.

“Well done, my love,” Harry said, and he kissed her. “So, on to the Cup?”

“Ginny, this one is yours,” Hermione said, passing the weapon to her beautiful ginger wife.

“Mine? But...”

Hermione kissed the little redhead. “Don't even think of saying you're not worthy, sweet Ginny. You suffered for nearly a year under Riddle's influence, and you fought him every minute. Someone else would have given in and used the basilisk to carry out the mass slaughter that vile fragment of a vile boy wanted to see at the very first opportunity. You managed to stop the beast killing anyone at all, even Filch's cat. We were only petrified, and the mandrake potion set us right. Do it, my love.”

She held Ginevra Potter in her arms, Harry and Luna on either side, as the bravest and prettiest of all the Weasley siblings prepared to end the possession of Hufflepuff's golden drinking vessel. The Cup cast up an image of Harry and Hermione driving off into the sunset in a gold-coloured BMW convertible with flashy chromed hubcaps and an atrocious aftermarket spoiler. Harry was dressed in a white dinner jacket with a puce bow tie, and Hermione wore a glittery scarlet evening gown that completely exposed her breasts, which seemed to have grown to approximately the size of her head.

_Merlin, it's like a scene_ _from_ _a_ _tenth-rate_ _James Bond_ _knock-off_ _. And does_ _Tom Riddle have a_ _breast-expansion_ _fetish, or_ _did_ _he_ _read so many back_ _issues of_ Teen Witch Weekly _that he thinks we're all_ _in a constant state of angst over our cup size_ _?_ Hermione rubbed Ginny's belly, slipping her fingers under the redhead's jumper and then between the buttons of her shirt, and nuzzled her plait aside to kiss and nibble the back of her neck, visualising her love and her desire sinking through her wife's skin and filling her bright mind and her pretty little body.

“I love you, my sweet little ginger. _We_ love you and we need you. Harry and I won't be going anywhere without our Ginny and our Luna.” She didn't care that Father Christmas was sitting in the armchair across from them. She'd not have cared if her own mum and dad had been in the room. Harry and Luna whispered their own loving words in Ginny's ears. The blade split the golden chalice as if it were only a prop made of shiny paper.

“That was a hideous excuse for a car, love,” Hermione said. “If you'd like, we could arrange driving lessons for you once things have settled down, and when you've got your full licence you could be the one to drive the four of us away on an adventure. We'd get a much prettier car, of course, maybe a Morgan or a vintage Morris? With the right charms, we could even set the car to drive itself when we felt like having a cuddle in the expanded back seat.”

“After some of the abominable piles of rusty iron Dad has bought out of scrap heaps and taken us on the roads in, I'm not sure I'd ever want to drive a car, whether it's purely Muggle or modified, but thank you very much for the offer, my darling.”

The four of them exchanged kisses, and then Ginny handed the Sword to Luna. “Here, love. I'm sorry to ask you to destroy a relic of Ravenclaw, but I'm afraid there's no helping it.”

Luna smiled. “It's all right, my sweet Ginevra. Tom Riddle's the one who destroyed it, and I'm only cleaning up the mess he left behind. Lady Rowena would want it that way.”

They surrounded her, Ginny behind and Harry and Hermione to her sides. The Diadem seemed to waver for twenty or thirty seconds, and at last it threw up a picture of a creature which wasn't exactly built like a giraffe or a horse or a giant rabbit but which definitely had a spiral horn on its forehead. Harry and Hermione had it on a leash and they were leading it towards a waiting cattle lorry which belonged to either the Saint Albans Zoo of Non-Existent Creatures or Mungo Broon and Sons, Butchers by Appointment to his Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh. Ginny was at the steering wheel, wearing a fuzzy pink top hat. _No absurdly large breasts, this time,_ _not on either of us_ _. Did th_ _e obsession not transfer to this particular iteration of Riddle_ _, or_ _can he sense_ _there's no use in trying to make our Luna feel badly about her body?_

Luna burst out laughing. “Stupid Tom, nobody puts a leash on a Crumple-horned Snorkack! My Harry and my Hermione are ever so much smarter than that. And my Ginevra would never wear such an ugly hat.” She flicked the Sword of Gryffindor in a perfect _moulinet,_ a circular sabre cut, and the Diadem of Ravenclaw was cloven in twain.

_Fascinating. I_ _'ve read enough to_ _know_ _that_ _a Viking-style sword should_ _be awkward at best when cutting from the_ _fingers and_ _wrist as one_ _does_ _with_ _a_ _fencing_ _sabre, but somehow the Sword of Gryffindor and_ _our dear_ _Luna made it work. Well done, my love._

Luna put the sword down on the table, and Hermione embraced her and kissed her. _I'm kissing Luna, with tongue, in front of Father Christmas and the House Elves_ , she thought, but she didn't mind and neither did her sweet blonde wife. Then it was time for Ginny to kiss her dearest friend and now wife, and for Harry to kiss Luna and all of his wives. It felt amazing, and Hermione didn't in the least care who might be about, any more than her spouses did.

Luna giggled. “Do you think the plural of 'spouse' might actually be 'spice'? I sort of like it that way, myself.”

Hermione took the blonde's chin in her hand, turned her face up, and planted a little kiss on the very tip of her nose. “My Aunt Esther who's an editor at the Oxford University Press would probably throw a fit, but I like it as well, my love.”

“Well, the plural of 'mouse' is 'mice,' so it stands to reason, my loves,” Ginny said, hugging both of them. “Perhaps we could explain it that way?”

“I doubt that would sway her, but I don't care. I love you, my darling spice.”

“We love you as well, sweetest Hermione,” Luna said. “And I'll try my very best to avoid getting into arguments about correct pluralisation with your aunt.”

 

#

 

Harry was glad to see the three Horcruxes destroyed, and it warmed his heart that his wives had wielded Gryffindor's Sword with their own hands. _They're strong, they're brave, they're well able to take care of themselves. I suppose there's a chance that I'll live through Voldemort's Avada Kedavra putting an end to the_ _piece of him that_ _he left behind in my scar_ _, but even if I don't, Hermione and Ginny and Luna will be able to take care of each other,_ _and_ _the_ _children_ _I hope we'll have, even if I never see them born_ _,_ _for the rest of their lives._ He tried to bury the thought so they'd not notice it, not wanting to spoil the happy moment.

“Not so fast, Harry James Potter,” Hermione said. “There will be no self-sacrificing or suicide missions done by anyone in our family, and all of our children will grow up with their father in their lives as well as their mothers. You'll put them on their first broomsticks, you'll take them to Platform Nine and Three Quarters, you'll give your daughters away at their weddings. God willing, the four of us will help to raise our great-grandchildren.”

“I'm sorry, love, but it's become clear to me that it's the only way to end the Dark Lord completely. I'm eternally grateful to all of you that I have had the happiness of marrying the women I love first. Let's enjoy ourselves whilst we're able, my loves. There's a slim chance I'll live, and in any case the Potter fortune will be yours when I'm gone. Our family will be well provided for, even if the Ministry won't do anything more for my heirs. Tell the children I love them, even if they'll not meet me till they cross to the other side.”

Hermione's eyes flashed fire. “Dumbledore was a manipulative fool, Harry. A brilliant fool, but still a fool. What use is my being the brightest witch of our age if my wives and I can't keep our husband alive?”

Luna slipped a finger under his jumper and inside his shirt, and tugged at the hairs round his navel. The touch of her skin against his seared him. “We'll not be gambling with your life, Harry Potter. And if you cross over, the rest of us will follow you immediately. I will not be like my Daddy.”

Harry felt the tears welling up in his eyes, and he stroked the little blonde's hair. “But you'll have Hermione and Ginny to keep you here, my love. And maybe a child or three as well?”

Ginny wrapped her arms about him. “No, my love. I will not birth a child to a dead husband.”

“None of us will,” Luna said. “A witch's magic and her fertility are entwined in a way very few men appreciate. We will not conceive until the Dark Lord is defeated. I declare it, who am a wife of Harry, Hermione, and Ginevra Potter.”

“In any event, it would be unwise to fall pregnant before our N.E.W.T.S.,” Hermione said. “And I think we'd do better to wait for a few more years even after we're done with them. However mature we feel, we're still young in biological terms. And as Witches, we three might well have a hundred years or more of potential fertility in store for us, as will you, my husband. I'll admit I rather like the idea of having children who would be decades younger than some of their nephews and nieces, but we'll have every chance of accomplishing that even if we wait till we're in our twenties.”

He felt his wives sorting through his knowledge. Hermione had known most of it already, of course, even some of what he thought he'd kept from her. “We'll kill Tom Riddle and his snake,” Ginny said, “which shouldn't even require getting in sword range, and then we'll go about living our lives. If he were able to take over your body, my husband, he would have done already. And don't forget we're married to the two smartest Witches in Britain. With them to keep an eye on you, we'll do fine.”

“The three smartest, sweet Ginny,” Hermione murmured, stroking her wife's ginger hair. “I've seen your marks.”

“If worse comes to worse I'm reasonably sure I could snipe our annoying pseudo-reptilian pest from a mile's distance, given a suitable rifle and our friend Dobby acting as my spotter, but I might prefer the idea of sending a letter bomb, perhaps one jacketed with scraps of basilisk fang for shrapnel,” Luna said, still absently fingering Harry's abdomen. “It would be sad to risk a post owl, but it is possible to instruct them to deposit their burdens by the recipient and depart at speed, and a ten-second fuze, activated on release, should give the bird time to escape the target zone before detonation. We'd be up front about the danger, and of course we'd offer combat pay. House Elves often act as agents in hiring freelance birds, so we'd not necessarily be forced to go to a post office, even in disguise. Or perhaps it would be better if one of our good Elfish friends would pop a somewhat larger device, contact or proximity-fuzed, to a point fifty feet above the Dark Lord's head? Gravity would do the rest, and he'd come away home again before it landed, of course.”

Hermione's eyes had gone wide when Luna spoke of sniping, but she smiled brightly. “Do tell us more, my love.”

“It might be wise to consult Ginevra's explosion-loving brothers, assuming we can get in touch with them, but I know a fair bit about such things myself. We're not just naturalists in my family, we're hunters as well. My grandmother always preferred to shoot her quarry, but there are times when a stick of dynamite is the best weapon for troll, especially if you're trying to clean out a colony of the miserable beasts in order to protect a farming village and rendering them for Potions ingredients is a secondary or tertiary concern.

“For that matter, she taught me that a satchel charge containing a stone's weight of mining explosives is a most effective means of taking down a Nundu when planted in the guts of a cow that died of disease and left near one of the creature's regular haunts. It's terribly wasteful in terms of the saleable parts, of course, but needs must when the Devil drives if you're in harm's way out in the bush, with a whole kraal of friends in danger as well as yourself, and your only working rifle is an ordinary Lee-Enfield. And Harry, my love, you could touch my belly as well, couldn't you?”

He reached under Luna's jumper and blouse and traced a little circle about her navel. Her skin there seemed softer than nearly anything ever he'd touched before, with delicate little hairs that he suddenly longed to see as well as feel. She giggled. “See, doesn't that feel nice? And think of all the other places you'll be touching all of us before we sleep. And again when we wake, needless to say.”

He slipped his fingertip into her navel, and she gasped. He might have pulled away, stammering apologies, if he'd not felt how much she welcomed the new contact. His body and his arousal responded to hers, as did those of their wives. His erection was almost painful, and he knew that all three girls were wet between their legs.

For an instant, Harry forgot the Dark Lord. He even forgot that they still had a guest in the tent. If Father Christmas hadn't coughed, he would have pulled Luna's garments up over her head and bared her to the waist with her eager co-operation. With the feedback loop of shared arousal running through him and the others, he felt as if he might strip all three of his wives completely naked in a fit of accidental magic such as hardly ever happened to anyone past their fourteenth year or so. As he looked in their eyes, it was clear that his own clothes would have remained on him for only a few seconds after theirs disappeared. He began to count breaths, forcing his arousal down, and his wives counted with him.

“Err, sorry, Father Christmas.”

“Don't worry. It's a natural reaction to your bonding. There are sound reasons why magical newly-weds were traditionally put to bed together directly after the wedding feast.

“Speaking of which, my dear Mister and Mesdames Potter, there's a much simpler way of driving poor mad Tom Riddle from the face of the Earth, and more importantly from that scar on Mister Potter's forehead. Albus Dumbledore, God rest his soul, wasn't wrong when he said your love was the power the Dark Lord knew not, even though he never came close to understanding the true implications of it.”

Luna closed one eye and squinted at Harry's forehead with the other. With a cautious finger, she reached up and touched the scar. He drew a breath in through his teeth. It didn't arouse him in the same way as touching and being touched under clothes had done, but it felt shockingly intimate. Not even Hermione had ever touched his scar, for all the hugs and gentle pats on his shoulder she'd given him since the end of their First Year. She'd wiped the sweat from his brow a time or two when he'd been in the Hospital Wing, but her skin had never brushed against the lightning-bolt mark, not even by accident.

“I see what you mean, Father Christmas. Harry's marrying us has loosened it.”

“Yes. And consummating your marriage will drive the Horcrux from Mister Potter completely. A small ritual carried out by the four of you before you take to your bed will mean the simultaneous destruction of the other two soul anchors; to wit, the poor mistreated serpent and the viciously pathetic homunculus body made of his father's bone, your husband's blood, and the lackey's severed hand.”

“And may God have mercy on his twisted soul,” Hermione said. “Good Lord, is it really that simple? Please tell me Harry had to be of age before we married in order for it to work.”

“I'm well able to shade the truth until some member of the genus _Sus_ takes to an arboreal existence and evolves the capacity for flight, Mrs. Potter, but I cannot tell a lie. An unmarried Wizard who saves the life of an unmarried Witch out of the sheer goodness of his heart can wed her at any time after both are old enough to be matched with a wand, and it needs only her own consent and his, not that of either family. If Albus Dumbledore hadn't put in such great efforts to deaden his own heart to any love other than an abstract affection for the human race as a whole—not to mention how he deadened himself to the very existence of physical and romantic love between human beings—he might have understood it was a mistake to encourage the two of you, as he did, to see each other as nothing more than friends after that incident on Halloween night.”

Hermione's jaw dropped. “Really? Dumbledore did that?”

“I'm afraid he did, Mrs. Potter. To be fair to his memory, he convinced himself that permitting you to think of yourselves as potential romantic partners would equal manipulating two First Years into marrying before they sat their first exams.”

Harry didn't know if he wanted to cry or to rage at Dumbledore's memory. “I thought of him as the closest thing to a grandfather I'd ever have. Please tell me he didn't dose us with potions or Obliviate us.” His wives hugged him close.

“No, Mister Potter. Your Headmaster was misguided, but he was not truly evil, and his sin was one of omission. His Legilimency told him the truth of what had happened there in the girls' WC and earlier in the day in the Charms classroom, but he deliberately chose not to act on that knowledge. If he had shared his observations with Minerva McGonagall, as any responsible educator would have done, you and Miss Granger, as she was then, would have been quietly taken to the Hospital Wing for an examination, in the course of which Poppy Pomfrey would have explained the concept of Life Debts, and the possibility that you would feel yourselves drawn together as you got to know each other better.”

“Oh Merlin, I would have gone spare,” Hermione said. “I was so convinced that nothing would ever go right in my life, and I would have been sure that I was stuck with Ron, because I couldn't possibly deserve the kind and adorable Boy Who Lived. I would have ended up owing you a second Debt when you stopped me jumping out the window, Harry. Mm, that might have been nice, actually, now that I think of it. If you'd tackled me and held me close, I probably would have kissed you right then and there.”

“I think I would have panicked if some random girl had tried to kiss me in First Year, but since it was you... I would have kissed you right back, Hermione, even with Madam Pomfrey and Professor McGonagall watching us.”

She squeezed his hand. “I know you would have done, love. Merlin, I wonder if any couple in their First Year ever have snogged each others' brains out on the floor of the Hospital Wing with the Matron and their Head of House looking on? Perhaps we could have earned a place in the next edition of _Hogwarts, a History._ ”

Luna stroked Hermione's hair. “Madam Pomfrey would have made sure you understood you could never owe a Life Debt to the person who put you into danger before she told you what a Life Debt actually meant. She's a very thoughtful person. I'm sure you and Harry could have snogged each other senseless later on when you had more privacy. Professor McGonagall thinks young love is a wonderful thing, but she's easily embarrassed, so it would have been kinder for you to refrain from putting your tongues down each others' throats in front of her.”

“Well, I'm glad it worked out this way,” Harry said. “I love you immensely, Hermione, but I know we need our wives.”

“I agree, love. One way or another, we would have had to make our Ginny and our Luna part of our family.”

Ginny smiled. “As soon as I found out what Ron had done, I would have known that the House of Weasley had no choice but to give me to the two of you as payment for the debt of honour we owed. I'd have made myself so annoying that Mum and Dad would have signed off on it just to have a moment's peace at home. Or else accidental magic alone might have brought me to Hogwarts so I could kneel at your feet and tell you I was your obedient little ginger bond-servant and you were both very welcome to kiss me in the Great Hall because it would drive my stupid brother mad. I don't know how we'd have got you in as well, Luna, but I'm sure we would have done, one way or another.”

“Oh, there's bound to have been a marriage contract between the House of Potter and the House of Lovegood somewhere back in history. And if I'd had any trouble finding the relevant parchment, I'd have forged a replacement. Considering that the Department of Marriage Contracts, much like the Centaur Liaison Office, is a dumping ground for incompetent personnel who can't be sacked because of their pedigree or their other connections, I'm sure I'd have succeeded in having it validated. And of course the contract would have included an extra clause about a beautiful brilliant brunette Muggleborn and a Weasley daughter being part of the marriage, just to make it airtight.”

Hermione laughed and stroked Luna's cheek. “Now I understand how useful it is to come from a family known for their gift of Second Sight.”

“It is, my darling. In many more ways than simply the gift of Second Sight itself.”

Something occurred to Harry. “Well, if consummation as well as the marriage ceremony was necessary to put an end to Tom Riddle, I suppose we would have needed to wait a few years in any case. I know I had, err... nocturnal emissions in First Year, but I really don't think I could have done, well, _it._ ”

“Yes, that might have been a bit much,” Hermione said, “but we could have had all sorts of fun whilst we waited. And when we were ready to give each other our virginity, it would have been the best first time ever.”

Father Christmas turned crimson. “Actually, consummation of a magical marriage can take various forms depending on the age of the participants.”

Luna giggled. “Yes. My great great great great great great great—that's seven, right?—grandparents were married at barely eleven years of age. I'm told it was a betrothal contracted in their infancy, but it was one that suited them. In any case, my seven greats grandmother was orphaned a fortnight after their Sorting, and as soon as she and her fiancé got word they feared her guardian might break the betrothal and set up a new one for his own benefit.

“Since they were the dearest of friends and already looking forward to marrying each other, they asked his older brother and their Head of House to arrange a ceremony, and were wed that very same afternoon in the Hogwarts Chapel by the curate of Saint Aidan's in Hogsmeade. The guardian, a particularly nasty distant cousin, challenged the legitimacy of their marriage on grounds of non-consummation, but a simple magical examination proved that eating from the same plate and drinking from the same goblet as was the custom for married couples, a few kisses on the lips at bedtime, spending the night in each others' arms, and a joyful little tickle-fight when they woke from the first sleep and before they cuddled up again for the second sleep had sufficed.”

Hermione brushed her fingers against Luna's cheek. “That sounds terribly sweet, love.”

“It does. And from reading their journals I've learnt that sex, when they did start having it a few years later, was incredible for them. They invented one of the first effective monthly contraceptive potions when they were in their sixties, because they felt ten children was enough and they also found foreplay sufficiently distracting, even after decades of married life, that they sometimes forgot to cast the contraceptive charm which most couples of their era were accustomed to use.”

Hermione winked. “Yes. Well, I trust we're old enough that consummation will mean, well, consummation?”

Father Christmas nodded and took a folded sheet of parchment from his breast pocket. “This will tell you how to carry out the ritual. And with that, I've only two more minor bits of business left before I can leave you to your wedding night. Dobby, Elf of Potter, have you brought your chosen mate?”

“I am being bringing her, my lord. But Winky is not being well...” The little female elf was leaning against Dobby's shoulder, supported by his arm. She looked even worse than the last time Harry saw her. If he'd not remembered her little blue hat and recognised some remnant of the shape of it, he'd have thought she was wearing a broken bit of muddy plastic flower pot on her head right now, and her skirt and blouse looked worse than Kreacher's pillowcase. He could feel Hermione's distress, and he reached out to comfort her, as did the other girls.

“Mister and Mesdames Potter, will you take this elf into your family?”

Winky struggled to focus her eyes. “Winky is not being worthy of joining a family. Winky is being a bad elf.”

Dobby said something in the elf language, and she began to cry. He tried to comfort her, as awkwardly and as sincerely as Harry himself might have done for Hermione in their First Year.

“You are most worthy, Winky,” Harry said. “You were loyal to the Crouches to the end, even though they didn't deserve you. House Potter would be honoured by such an elf.”

Hermione knelt before the two elves, as she might have knelt down to talk with a shy small child. “We'll be delighted to have you, Winky.”

Luna knelt beside her. “You will be very welcome in our family, Miss Winky. I imagine you might have fun cleaning up our stables, once our lives have settled down enough to establish them. I suspect our Hermione might like to have a pony that isn't me or Ginevra wearing amusing accessories, and I'm hoping to invite some very interesting exotic hoofed creatures to live with us as well. Not to mention I expect a certain Hippogriff would be pleased to move in, and he'll very likely bring a mate or two.”

Ginny knelt and held out her hand to Winky. “We would all be honoured by your company. Dobby is our husband's very dear friend, and I can tell that he needs you just as much as our Harry needs us. We'll have babies in a few years, and we'd love to have you help us with them. Please, join our family.”

Winky nodded, seemingly too overcome with emotion to speak, and Harry knelt beside his wives, facing the two elves. Hermione took his hand. “I accept Winky as an Elf of House Potter.” The girls spoke in unison with him.

Winky stood up straight, although Dobby's arm remained about her and hers about him. She grew in height to match her mate, and her battered ragged clothes blurred and shifted into a neat uniform, something like a soldier's battledress, with the Potter crest on the sleeve. Dobby wore much the same now. Both had mismatched socks on their feet, and hats that looked suspiciously like those Hermione had knitted back in the days of S.P.E.W. “Winky is thanking you, Great Sir Master Harry Potter and Great Ladies Mistresses Potters.”

Father Christmas made a gesture of benediction, and the Elves genuflected to him. “Kreacher, Elf of Black,” he said, “you have never mated, have you?”

Kreacher appeared. “Once, Milord, Kreacher would have been wishing to be mated, but the elf-maid he was wishing for his mate was being given to House Lestrange in amongst the dowry of the Mistress Bellatrix. Kreacher is making his peace, Milord.”

“It would be right for the future generations of the House Black to include elves. Elves living under the old ways, as family, with no severing of heads or ironing of hands. Mister Potter, your godfather's will makes you Head of Black as well as Head of Potter. Is it your wish and that of your ladies that the House should continue?”

Harry looked to his wives. “One of my three greats grandmothers was a Black,” Luna said, “as was your own grandmother, my husband. They haven't always been a Dark House, despite the name.”

Hermione nodded. “Luna's right. And it would be appropriate to keep the names of Sirius and Regulus alive, as more than just some footnote in the history books. Even if we write the books ourselves to make sure the right people are given the credit they deserve, it would be easy for that to happen without a House of Black to stand up for their memory.”

“We could pass the headship on to one of our children, in time,” Ginny said. “Perhaps a few hundred years from now 'like the Blacks and the Potters' will be what everyone will say when two Houses are the best of friends and allies.”

Harry knew they were right. “It is our will, Father Christmas.”

“Tansy, born an Elf of House Black, I summon you, I who am called Father Christmas in the English tongue, Baron Christmastide as the House Elves style me in that language.” In moments, a fourth Elf appeared. She had a frail look about her, much as Kreacher had when Harry and Hermione first met him. She began to drop to her knees before Father Christmas, just as Dobby and Kreacher had done, but then she saw Kreacher and she flung herself into his arms. They babbled to each other in the elf language.

Harry glanced at his wives, and saw and felt their approval. “As Head of Black, I welcome Tansy back to the House. If she would wish to be, she may become the mate of Kreacher.”

“Tansy is very greatly wishing that, Milord Master of the House of Black.” With much the same suddenness, she became healthy and clean. She kissed Kreacher on the lips, and then both made the full obeisance not to Father Christmas but to Harry and his wives.

“Please, Tansy of Black, Kreacher of Black, rise.”

She and Kreacher were clad properly now, not in military-style clothing such as Dobby and Winky had chosen but in elaborately wrapped garments which they wore with all the dignity of a miniature duke and duchess at some grave public ceremony. Harry could feel Hermione's delighted amusement, and her knowledge told him the elves were dressed in the toga and stola of a Roman senator and his wife, although the fabric of both outfits had started out as bedsheets embroidered with the Black crest. They bowed to the Potters. Only then did they gracefully make their obeisance to Father Christmas.

He said something else in the elf tongue. “There, that's the blessing on both marriages. And perhaps now I should take my leave, so all you newly-weds may go and, err... do what newly-weds do?”

“As you wish, Father Christmas,” Harry said, knowing it was his duty to speak as Head of House and that his wives agreed. The elves bowed again and popped away, two by two.

Harry and his wives followed Father Christmas to the door, where they hugged him good bye.

“I've just one question,” Luna said. “Did you really mean to say, with that remark about the genus _Sus_ , that at some point in the future pigs will fly?”

He winked. “That, my dear, would be telling. And before I forget, you'll want this.” He slipped a wand out of his pocket and pressed it into her hand.

Luna beamed at him, and Harry knew this was her own wand which had been taken from her by the Dark Lord's servants on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters. “Oh, my! Thank you, Father Christmas!”

“It's all part of the job, my dear. Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”

They watched as the sleigh flew off into the night, and Harry shut the door and turned the bolt. It was scarcely necessary with all the security charms in place outside, but it made the tent feel even more like their own home, and he felt his wives' quiet approval. Hermione was already looking at the parchment. “Oh, that's excellent, my loves. This is a sky-clad ritual.”

“Of course it is, my treasure,” Luna said. “All of the best rituals for husbands and wives to do together require nudity. And speaking of being sky-clad, my loves, would someone please be so kind as to take my clothes off, or will I do it myself?”

Harry pulled off her jumper. The tails of her blouse came up with it, and he saw a flash of her pale belly. She helped him to peel his own off, and then she threw her arms about him and pressed her face to his chest. “Thank you, my husband. But as I think of it, you should lay our Hermione bare first.”

Hermione put down the parchment and embraced both of them. “It's all right, Luna my love. I know how much you like not having clothes on.”

“I know that you know, my love Hermione, but _I_ also know how very long you've been longing to have Harry take yours off. It's only fair, since you've been his the longest of us.”

Ginny added herself to the hug. “Yes, my loves. Hermione should be first. Luna and I can indulge our fantasies about kneeling nude at the feet of a fully clothed Harry and Hermione some other day.”

Luna made a little purring noise. “Indeed. We can play with collars and leashes at our leisure, but tonight our Harry needs us to be his wives more than he needs us to be his slave girls. Not that there should necessarily be any great distinction between the two roles, at least not when we're alone and at play, but I think this is one of those cases where the details really do make a difference.”

“If you're sure, my dear wives?” Hermione whispered. She was tingling with anticipation, and he knew she could tell, just as he could, that Ginny and Luna were looking forward to seeing him undress his best friend who was now much more, but she still seemed to need the verbal reassurance. She was chewing on her bottom lip. He'd always found that expression endearing, and he sensed that he wasn't the only one.

Ginny laughed. “Yes, Hermione. You and Harry have been a couple since he was eleven and you were twelve. Just because it took you six years to notice doesn't change the fact that you have been. It's about time he took your clothes off you.”

“Well, Harry, it looks as if the ayes have it. Will you, please?”

“As you wish, my loves.” He kissed each of his wives, and then they arranged themselves in a cross formation, with Harry facing Hermione and Ginny and Luna looking in at them from either side.

Hermione smiled at him, a little nervously, and if he'd not been able to sense her feelings and desires he might have been concerned that she didn't really want to do this right now. But he could feel her, could feel the tingling in her body and the soft sweet fire that smouldered between her legs. He could feel her eagerness, and her hopes that her body really would meet his approval.

“Of course it will, my darling wife. You're Hermione, and Hermione is by definition perfect. I love you.”

“I love you as well, Harry. Please?”

“Yes.” He pulled her jumper over her head. She stood before him, glowing, clad in jeans and the plain white long-sleeved shirt she'd worn to keep the wool from her skin. It had buttons, not all the way down, but four of them from the collar going to just below her breasts. He undid each of them, pausing to kiss the skin revealed. With that done, he took her in his arms and pulled the tails free of her trousers. He pulled the shirt up over her head and arms, with her help, and Hermione was bare above the waist but for her bra. He'd never seen her navel before, unless one counted sharing her visualised fantasy of their younger selves in the pond, and he couldn't resist reaching down and giving it a little rub.

She giggled and pressed herself into his caress. “That feels so nice, Harry, but don't forget there's further to go. You're going to have me naked bare soon enough, and I'll be nude all night. Who knows? Maybe none of us will wear clothes again until we absolutely have to leave this spot. Considering we have Dobby and Winky to take care of the shopping and once we've sent the Dork Lard to his eternal reward we'll have no compelling need to go anywhere else, it might be a fortnight or more that you'll have no higher duties but to pet and rub and tickle and play with your naked girls. Do you like the idea? I have to confess I rather do, my Harry.”

“Yes, love.” He didn't know what to do next. “Err... should I take off your bra? Or your shoes?”

“Mm, you're so thoughtful, my love. My shoes, please?”

He knelt to untie them, and she steadied herself with a hand on his shoulder as he helped her pull her feet out. _I don't know if I should feel dominant or submissive right now,_ he thought.

“Both, my love,” Hermione whispered. “I'm yours, and soon I'll be nude before you, because it's what we both want. Even when I'm wearing a collar and kneeling at your feet, which is something I've dreamt about for years and am looking forward to doing now and then, you'll still belong to me every bit as much as I belong to you.”

“Yes. I will. I'd belong to you even if you were my slave or my pet, and legally only that, instead of my wife.” He kissed her navel, and she twined her fingers in his hair, hugging his head to her belly. Then she helped him to his feet. He reached down, unbuckled her belt, undid the top button of her jeans, and opened her zip. The trousers fell down about her ankles, and she stepped out of them.

She was amazing. Wearing nothing but her plain pale blue cotton knickers, a simple white bra, and a pair of grey socks, her hair tied back in a plait, Hermione stood before him, a shy little smile on her face. He could have spent hours simply contemplating her dressed just as she was.

“Oh, love, you're a wonderful sight, as well as being just plain wonderful,” Luna breathed. “I always used to think underwear was simply rather annoying, but you make it look very beautiful and sexy, Hermione. I'm not saying I'll start wearing knickers and bras and things myself when I don't have to, but it's lovely to have a new perspective.”

“She does make it look nice, doesn't she?” Ginny said. “I wish you'd played Quidditch, Hermione, because you'd have been such an ornament for the girls' changing room. Or maybe I don't, because I probably would have given in to the post-match hormones, stripped you completely, given you multiple screaming orgasms with no concern for the Chasers looking on, and then dragged you out to find Harry and Luna without even taking a shower first or stopping for either of us to put on our clothes. It would have been brilliant, well worth the points we might have lost if McGonagall had caught us stark naked on the pitch as we carried Harry off to have our wicked way with him, but Angelina Johnson would have teased us about it for the rest of our lives.”

Hermione blushed. “Thank you, loves, but I know my bottom's too big...”

“Nonsense,” Harry said, and he kissed her. “It's perfect. It's yours.” He cupped her bottom, just to show her how much he liked it, and then he trailed his fingers along the waistband of her knickers and up her spine to the catch of her bra. Her own knowledge, and that of Luna and Ginny, told him how to unsnap it in one smooth motion, and he peeled the straps off down her arms, rubbing her shoulders to soothe the places where they'd made little marks on her skin. She purred happily and rested her head on his shoulder for a moment, planting a little kiss on his neck.

“Go ahead, love, take it off completely,” she whispered after a moment, and he backed off to arms' length, helping the straps downward. The cups fell away from her breasts, and for an instant the bra was about both her wrists like a set of soft cloth manacles. She grinned at him. “We'll have fun with tying my hands some other time, I think. But for now...” She let the bra fall to the floor.

Her breasts were amazingly beautiful, so much prettier than any of the pictures he'd seen. The left was slightly bigger than the right, which he found endearing and attractive even though he sensed it was something she'd worried about in the past. She wasn't a painting or a sculpture or a model whose photograph had been airbrushed or magicked into perfect symmetry. She was Hermione. His and Luna's and Ginny's Hermione. He reached up and cupped her sweet breasts in his palms. They fit perfectly.

She drew a breath in between her teeth. “Oh, that feels wonderful, love. I've been wanting you to do that for as long as I've had anything there to speak of.”

“They feel wonderful. You're wonderful, Hermione.”

Ginny whistled. “Turn our pretty girl about, Harry, and let us have a look?”

He would have worried that they were taking it too far and embarrassing Hermione, but he could feel her delight at being admired. She gave him a little nod, and he stepped back. With his hand on her shoulder, he encouraged her to turn about in place, displaying her nearly nude body to their wives.

“Beautiful,” Luna said. “You're prettier than a Snorkack in summer, Hermione.”

“You're stunning, Hermione, and your breasts are gorgeous,” Ginny said. “I suppose now I know why we always changed clothes back to back, those times when you slept in my room. If I'd got a good look at your body, I would have been hard pressed not to molest you.”

Hermione blew Ginny a kiss. “I think I would have molested you first, actually, darling.” Her nipples looked as hard as little pink pebbles. “Go on, Harry, you can touch them,” she whispered, and he laid a gentle fingertip on one. “Ooooh! That's... it's wonderful, love, but maybe we should continue?”

He hugged her and kissed her on the lips. At her silent prompting, he knelt again and drew off her socks. He'd seen Hermione's toes before, but they looked, if that were possible, even lovelier than they had back then. He massaged them lightly, picking off a few bits of lint left behind from her socks.

He leant forward and kissed her leg right above her knee. She laughed. “Oh, that's nice, my love. Now come you back up here, please. Your girl's still got one piece of clothing left, and she'd really like to be fully bare before her husband and her wives.”

He looked her in the eye. “As you wish, my Hermione.”

“I do wish, my Harry.” He hugged her, stroking her hair, and trailed his fingers down her plait, down her spine, down to her waist. He slipped his forefingers inside the elastic waistband of her knickers, and she gasped. He was glad he could feel how happy she was to be touched, because if he'd not been able to he would have feared it was too much for her. Gently, he brought his hands around to her sides. The space between his thumb and his fingers seemed made to fit perfectly around her hips.

“Oooh,” she murmured as he slipped his thumbs inside her waistband, caressing her hipbone. Her eyes were closed. Slowly, he pulled her knickers down, past her hips, down to her thighs, down to her knees, down to her ankles. She stepped out of them and stood nude before him.

She trembled a little bit, and he could feel her fighting the urge to shield the glorious tuft of curly brown hair at the juncture of her thighs with her hand. “It's all right if you do, love.”

“No, it's not,” she said. “I'm yours. All of this is yours.” She gestured, sweeping her hand from her head downwards. “Being shy in front of you would be as silly as not looking at myself in the mirror.” She smiled and stood up straight, enjoying his gaze and that of their wives. “Mm. You really do think I'm pretty, don't you?”

“Of course I do. And I'm yours as well, you know.” He reached out to touch her, to reassure her, and although he'd been thinking more in terms of patting her hip, his hand went straight to her sex as if drawn by a special sort of magnetism. Those pretty little hairs were very damp, and what lay beneath was soft and warm. “Ohhhhhhhh! Oh, my Harry!” She hugged him, trapping his hand between their bodies. “That feels nice. Leave your fingers right where they are a little longer, please, my love. Have you any idea how many times, since the very day I met you, even before you saved me from a troll and claimed my heart forever, I've had mine down there, trying as hard as I could to pretend they were yours?”

He hugged her with his free arm. “Shall I, err... keep on with it?”

She smiled and kissed him on the lips. “Actually, my love, just that little bit of contact is perfect. I think it would be brilliant if you would leave me to simmer, as it were, whilst you strip our wives.”

“As you wish. Do you want to take my clothes off? Or would you rather I did it myself?”

He loved the way Hermione wrinkled up her nose when she laughed. He always had, ever since the very first time he saw her laughing, but he'd never thought about it before. “No, silly. We'll take them off you together once all of us girls are bare. Ginny and Luna have been longing for years to be nude in front of you as well, you know. It would be cruel to make them wait any longer.”

His fingers were wet. Hermione's lubricant was thicker than sweat or water, a little bit sticky, and it felt wonderful on his skin. He brought his hand up to his nose and sniffed Hermione's musk. It was the most fantastic scent he'd ever known, better than the food at his first Welcoming Feast after a lifetime of near starvation, better than the smell of polish and seasoned wood that had filled his nose when he unwrapped his first broomstick, better than anything. He licked his fingers. There weren't words for how much he liked the taste.

“Ooh, she tastes nice, doesn't she?” Luna whispered. “Could Ginevra and I have a bit?” He held out his hand, and the little blonde grasped him by the wrist. He thought for a moment that she might engulf his fingers and suck them clean, but instead she took a delicate little lick. “Oh, that's delicious. Here, Ginevra, taste.”

Ginny blushed. “I'd like to try it straight from the tap later, but that sounds awfully nice.” Her tongue caressed Harry's fingers, and then the two girls from Ottery St. Catchpole were mouth to mouth, licking and kissing each other as much as they were Harry's hand.

Hermione hugged him from behind, pressing her whole body against his. She was warm all over, and he could feel one particular point of heat up against his buttock. “Our wives are adorable, aren't they?”

“Yes, they are.” He reached behind him with his free hand and caressed her bottom.

She sighed happily. “Mm, that's nice, love. The only problem is, I don't know if we'll ever be able to eat ice cream again without thinking of this moment.”

“And is that a bad thing?”

Hermione nibbled his ear. “As long as you don't mind us never being able to have an ice cream in a public place, it's brilliant.”

“We could always use a Notice-me-not Charm,” Luna said.

Ginny kissed her once again. “Or we could Apparate away to a private location as soon as we finish our ice cream, which sounds excellent. Let's just try to remember to keep our clothes on until we leave. Florean Fortescue's a friend of Dad's, and it would embarrass him if we didn't.”

Luna tugged lightly on Ginny's plait. “Come, my love, enough talking. It's time for Harry Potter to take your clothes off, isn't it?”


	4. In Which Ginny Potter and Luna Potter are Also Undressed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once again, it's pretty much what it says on the tin.
> 
> Also, we learn a few details about sexual education at Hogwarts and Luna's family history.

Ginny felt as if she might explode at so much as a single touch. Watching Harry strip Hermione was one of the most erotic experiences of her life. She'd been dreaming of something like this for years, to be honest, at least since the long-ago day when she'd woke up in the Hospital Wing and realised that she really had been saved by Harry Potter, just like one of the girls in the Boy Who Lived books, that Tom Riddle was gone and that there was a brilliant and beautiful Muggleborn who also loved Harry and who belonged to him just as much as Ginny herself did.

But the reality was so much better than the fantasies. She'd always known that Harry would be gentle and patient and tender with his girls, and she'd hoped that tenderness would include a willingness to take a leading role when they wanted him to take it. But she'd never been able to imagine quite this level of affectionate domination, not even when she lay in bed fantasising that her parents had disowned her for not knowing better than to trust a diary that wrote back to her when she couldn't see where it kept its brain, imagining how she would have stood trembling in the corridor outside the Hospital Wing— _barefoot on the stone flags, dressed in nothing but a_ _plain iron_ _collar and the threadbare shirt I'd had underneath my robes,_ _an old one from the second hand shop_ _which had been kind of skimpy even before it_ _got_ _torn_ _when the school House Elves took my uniform away because I wasn't a pupil any more, but only Harry Potter's property—_ as Madam Pomfrey handed her leash to Harry.

Harry waited for Hermione's consent every step of the way, of course, but when he knew she did consent, he acted. It had been delicious to watch them, and even more delicious to feel the emotions of both her naked wife and her clothed husband.

Although she was completely dressed, Ginny felt as if she was already almost as exposed as Hermione. And she knew in her very bones—and would have known by scent alone, even without the magical connection from their marriage—that the older girl was every bit as wet as she herself.

And here she was, licking Hermione's juices off Harry's fingers and kissing Luna. Not even her wildest fantasies had come close to this. She knew her knickers were soaked through, and she wondered if her trousers might be as well. _I hope I_ _'ll not_ _need_ _to wear them for a while, because even a House Elf might have trouble getting them clean again._

Hermione, standing unashamed like the alpha wife she was even though she was nude and the others were still fully clothed, made a joke about ice cream, and Ginny managed to play along a bit with a comment about trying not to embarrass Florean Fortescue even though most of her consciousness was too busy thinking about how nice her senior wife's lubricant tasted on Harry's skin and how much she was looking forward to finding out if, as she suspected, it would taste even better directly from Hermione's sex.

Then Luna tugged lightly on her hair, just the way she liked, and said “Come, my love, enough talking. It's time for Harry Potter to take your clothes off, isn't it?”

“Oh, yes! But wait, you'll want him to take yours off as well, my darling. I can wait. You've been through so much, my Luna, and I know how you feel about clothes, and... well, I can wait. Oh, I already said that, didn't I?”

Luna kissed her. “Yes, you did, sweet. But please don't be embarrassed at repeating yourself, because there are so many wonderful distractions around us, like our very own beautiful naked bare Hermione who would make the _Medici Venus_ look rather ordinary if we stood her up, dressed just as she is, on a pedestal in the Uffizi Gallery—not that we will, of course, unless we can visit when they're closed, throw out all the guards, and turn off the security cameras—and our handsome Harry who's so very good at taking girls' clothes off their bodies. I thank you for your thoughtfulness, my Ginevra, but I'm looking forward to seeing our husband undress you and I'll be happy to wait. After all, you've been waiting for this moment almost as long as our Hermione has been, haven't you?”

“Well... yes.”

Luna hugged her, and then she took Ginny by the shoulders to present her to Harry and Hermione. “Here you are, my dearest husband and master and my dearest wife and mistress. One cute little ginger from the Otterside who needs to be rescued from the confines of her clothes. Looks like another job for the Boy Who Lived and the Girl Who Kept Him That Way, don't you agree?”

Ginny smiled brightly at her Harry and her Hermione. “Please, my loves?”

Hermione gave Harry a little push. “Go on, darling, strip our Ginny. She had the pleasure of watching you do it to me, after all. I'll enjoy seeing you at work.”

“As you wish, my love.” He pinched Hermione's bottom, just hard enough to please her. It was nice to hear her squeak and to feel the little burst of happiness.

And now he hugged Ginny. She hugged him back and buried her face in the angle of his neck and shoulder, enjoying the scent of him. She'd missed that so much. “I love you, Harry.”

“I love you, Ginny.” He was caressing her back, his hands up under her jumper. “Are you ready to do this?”

“You know I am, silly Harry. I've been ready to do this since the first moment I saw you.”

“Really?”

“Yes! I know we were awfully young, and I'm sure it's just as well we didn't do it in real life, but Harry Potter undressing me? If I'd been offered the opportunity, I would have signed on for it without a second thought, even back then.”

He chuckled. “That might've been kind of awkward on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters. I don't think either of us knew how to cast a Notice-me-not Charm yet. And as I recall there wasn't much time before I had to get on the train.”

“Well, you would have had to take me with you. That could have been fun. Especially if we'd found seats in Hermione's compartment.”

“Mm, that does sound nice,” Hermione said. “We could have bonded over playing with a cute little red-headed girl, and no need for a troll in the toilets on Halloween.”

Ginny blew her a kiss. “Or for my stupid brother, either, love. Ron and Percy would've gone spare when they got off the Express and found out I was coming to Hogwarts a year early as the pet of Harry Potter and his brilliant Muggleborn lady, and the Twins wouldn't have known whether to be appalled or to congratulate me for the greatest prank ever played by a Weasley.”

Harry kissed her neck. “That would have been nice. But I don't know if I would have been quite brave enough to share a compartment with two adorable girls at that age, especially if they'd told me I had to take their clothes off them.”

“I'm sure you would have managed, Harry. You're so very good at taking care of us.” She nibbled at his neck. “In any case, I love what your hands are doing, but I'm really looking forward to feeling it directly on my bare skin.”

“As you wish.” He gathered the hem of her jumper and rolled it up to her armpits. She helped him to pull it up over her head, and he immediately went to work on her shirt buttons. _Oh, you could just rip it o_ _ff me_ _, my_ _sweet_ _Harry_ _._ _The House Elves_ _would_ _thank you for giving them more_ _mending._

“We can play 'Highwayman Harry Enslaves His Helpless Cuddly Captives' tomorrow night, darling.” He dropped a little kiss between her breasts, and went on carefully undoing her buttons. She moaned in happy frustration. He was tormenting her more effectively than he could have done with any flogger. After forty seconds that felt like four hours, he slipped her shirt off her shoulders and let it fall to the floor.

She embraced him and wriggled against him, letting him feel her nipples through her bra and his shirt. They were hard enough that she was certain he could have felt them through full robes, or even a shirt of mail. It was wonderful, but it was nothing like enough. As much as she liked the ritual of being undressed so carefully, each of them in turn, part of her wished Harry had simply used a spell to strip all three of his wives naked on the very instant Father Christmas' sleigh was over the horizon, or that he'd told Winky to take the girls' clothes away for washing. _I'd not want to embarrass her, so we shouldn't ask, but that does sound delicious._ “Oh, Luna, my love, you're so lucky to not need one of these stupid things. I wish I didn't, either.”

“Oh, I don't know, Ginevra. As much as I might have a moral and philosophical objection to the over-use of undergarments as is so prevalent in our society, they _are_ rather appealing on my sweet wives...”

Harry chuckled and stroked all over her back, pausing now and then to play with the catch.

“Please, Harry, my darling husband...”

He took pity on her, and unsnapped her bra. In seconds, it was on the floor. Harry returned to his gentle rubbing, and she was amazed to feel the pleasure he took in such a little thing as the trickle of sweat down her spine. They shared a kiss, and he felt precisely when she was ready for him to let go so she could back off to arm's length and enjoy her Harry's first sight of his topless Ginny.

She stood with her hands on her hips, grinning, enjoying the way Hermione's gaze and Luna's washed over her breasts as well. “Mm, did you always feel that way, my Luna?”

“I suppose it wasn't quite the same thing until we hit puberty, Ginevra, but I've always thought you looked especially nice without your clothes, ever since the very first time we went for a bathe together. If I hadn't somehow known we were waiting for our Harry and our Hermione, I imagine I would have proposed we should be lovers much earlier; on the very instant we were old enough, I should think.”

“Mm, I can see why,” Hermione murmured. She and Luna had their arms about each other; the clothed blonde was rubbing the nude brunette's belly, and Hermione's hand was well up under Luna's shirt.

Harry rested his hands on her sides, and for an instant Ginny's world seemed to shrink to just those points of contact. He slid his hands up, slowly, and cupped her breasts just as he'd done with Hermione's. For an instant, she worried that her little breasts, whole lemons to Luna's half-lemons, would never please him as well as Hermione's comfortably apple-sized ones, even though the older girl's small C cups were hardly more than bumps when compared with the mammaries of many women in the naughty books and broadsheets Ginny had sneaked out of her brothers' stashes when she was twelve or thirteen. “Oh!” A sudden sharp pleasure washed through her. Harry had tweaked her nipples. Now he went back to rolling her breasts gently in his palms.

“Don't be silly, love. They're my Ginny's breasts, and therefore they're perfect. Just as Hermione's breasts are perfect because they're Hermione's, and Luna's breasts are perfect because they're Luna's. The breasts of some witch in a magazine are less than nothing compared to the breasts of my wonderful wives. Remember that, my pet.”

“Yes, my lord and master. I hear and obey.” She could only hold the submissive expression and the downcast eyes for a moment before her face burst into a grin, and she flung herself into Harry's arms for another hug and a kiss that pushed her nearly to the edge of orgasm, even in the complete absence of clitoral stimulation.

“Mm, it seems as if my girl's shoes had better come off, hadn't they? I can't very well peel her trousers down over them, or leave her stumbling about with her legs bound together at the ankles.”

“Please do,” Hermione said. “And when we want to tie her up later on, there are any number of better ways.”

Luna kissed Hermione's neck. “Mm, it sounds as if Madam Pomfrey gave you the same pamphlets as she gave to me.”

“You mean there are different ones?”

“I'm pretty sure there are, my love. It would be rather silly to explain cunnilingus in exacting detail to a boy like Justin Finch-Fletchley or Vincent Crabbe whose only interest in oral sex would be giving and receiving fellatio, wouldn't it?”

“I suppose you're right.” Hermione paused for a moment, and then her face went red. “Oh my God, she knew! I'm so embarrassed...”

“Myself I suspect it's the pamphlets that know, darling. But in any case, Madam Pomfrey would never tell a soul, not even Professor McGonagall.”

“And I thought the boy in the engravings just had black hair because the engraver had flipped a Sickle, and the girls were—eep! Oooh, Luna, that's lovely!” Luna had pinched Hermione's bottom to startle her out of her spiral of embarrassment, and then massaged her breasts. _Mm, that felt nice, even second hand, and I'm looking forward to trying it myself, in both roles,_ _with_ _both of them._

Harry knelt down, unlaced Ginny's trainers, and helped her to take them off. She used his shoulder to steady herself, just as Hermione had done. He planted a little kiss on her hip, and she gasped, even though it was barely more than a brush of his lips with both trousers and knickers between them and her skin.

“Would... would you get my socks as well, love?”

“As you wish.” He rolled them down and off. The soft carpet was lovely under her bare feet, but Harry massaging her toes felt far better.

“Oh, that's so nice, love. Mm, I've been fantasising about kneeling at your feet for years, but I never dreamt how nice it would be to have you kneeling at mine. Does that make me a naughty little pet in need of punishment for daring to pretend I'm dominating my master?”

He grinned and blew a raspberry on her belly button. She squealed, laughing helplessly, and pretended she was trying to escape. He gripped her hips, holding her to him, and his tongue probed at her navel. She couldn't imagine that tasting very good, but she could tell that Harry liked it and it felt better than she could have imagined. He stood, kissing his way up her body, and hugged her. With one hand about her back, he opened her belt and the top button of her trousers. He tickled her belly, just above the waistband of her knickers, and reached to open her fly the rest of the way. She felt his mild flicker of surprise when he found not a zip, but another button.

“Sorry, love. I know it's kind of old-fashioned...”

“Don't be sorry, my Ginny. I think it's brilliant. They really do look nice on you, and buttons are fun!”

“Hmm... I think I'll look nicer and be much more fun when I'm naked, but as you please, my husband.” Taking pity on her, he made short work of the remaining buttons, and her trousers slid down to her ankles. She kicked them away.

He stepped aside, keeping his hand on her shoulder, just as he'd done with Hermione. “Look, my loves, isn't she beautiful?”

“Oh, yes,” Hermione said. Ginny felt oddly vulnerable, as if she had been stood on a pedestal and the older girl were a judge evaluating her at a beauty contest or even an agricultural fair, despite the fact that Hermione was nude and Ginny still had her plain white knickers. _Which anybody can see have been darned more than once and expanded with charms as I grew... I_ _wish I'd_ _just done a Luna and gone without._ “She's a real beauty. Turn her about so we can see that lovely little bum, please?”

The embarrassment vanished as Harry's gentle hand turned her. This was nothing more than a playful game between people who loved each other, and Ginny had been fully clothed a few minutes earlier when he handled Hermione in exactly the same way. He stroked her under her chin, pretending to make her stand up straight, and turned her in another circle.

“She's gorgeous,” Luna said. “If I were a judge, I'd give her a twelve out of ten. And if I were buying her in a slave market, my only request would be that you pull those silly knickers off her, even though she does look very cute in them, and let me see her pretty quim and all the freckles on her bottom.”

“Please do, Harry?” she whispered. “It's time.”

He hugged her. “It is, my red-headed beauty.” He toyed with her plait for a moment, using the end to tickle her cheek, and she made a frustrated little whine, even though she did enjoy how he was playing with her. He trailed his hands down her spine, much as he'd done with Hermione, and slipped his fingers inside her waistband. He rolled her knickers down to her hips, and she felt as if a draught, or even a cool little breeze, had suddenly caressed her sex and the cheeks of her bottom even though the room was warm and she knew the tent sealed out the wind as well as the walls of the Burrow did, if not rather better.

She made another soft helpless animal noise. He took pity on her, and pushed her knickers down to her ankles without any more teasing. She kicked them aside, and he stood back to examine her. She clasped her hands behind her back, feeling deliciously vulnerable. “See, my loves, I _am_ a natural red-head.” He touched her belly, and she gasped. He trailed his fingertips down lower, down to the fringes of her pubic hair.

She looked him in the eye, and he smiled happily as he pinched a few strands between the tip of his forefinger and his thumb, not pulling on them, but simply touching them, rolling them softly in his fingertips. She'd never imagined such a thing, but it felt nice. “Like copper and ivory,” he said. “Merlin, you girls seem to be turning me into a poet.”

“Thank you, love. And... I did notice that a lot of the witches in the magazines had shaved down there. If you'd prefer...”

He laid a fingertip on her lips. “As you wish, my love, but I prefer my wives to do what makes them happy. I don't really give a tinker's damn for the naked witches in the broadsheets you nicked from your brothers, or for the Muggle women in Dudley's _Penthouse_ and what have you, because I have three beautiful wives who are prettier than any of them.”

“Really, my love?”

“Yes, really. The only thing I find interesting about naughty witch magazines any more is the delicious thought of my sweet Ginny looking at them. Did she play with herself as she did that, hmm? Did she seal her bedcurtains with charms, strip off her clothes, cast a soft _Lumos,_ open up her copy of 'Lucretia Lascivious and Sensuous Shakti in the Temple of Tender Doom,' and tickle this pretty little flower of hers?” He caressed her mound, very softly, not quite touching her opening. It felt wonderful. And that particular series, which she'd found hidden in Bill's old room, meaning she'd felt free to keep it instead of stealthily returning it at her next opportunity as she had always done with the naughty books and pictures she borrowed from her still-resident brothers, _was_ one of Ginny's very favourites, which was probably why Harry had noticed it amongst her memories.

Many of the women in her brothers' secret collections hadn't been very much to Ginny's taste. Ron, in particular, seemed to have a preference for breasts that were magically enlarged to the point of being more comical than sexy, at least in his sister's opinion. Lucretia, on the other hand, was a brown-haired woman who looked a bit like a post-Hogwarts version of Hermione, although she wasn't half as pretty as their brunette wife, and Shakti bore a slight resemblance to a twenty-something Parvati Patil. The pictures of the two witches making love in an ancient temple decorated with erotic carvings had fuelled some spectacular fantasies where Ginny went to visit Hermione in her dorm one night, found her in _flagrante delicto_ with the lovely Indian girl, and was invited to join them. _I_ _suppose I really did_ _kn_ _o_ _w_ _perfectly well_ _that Parvati and Hermione wouldn't_ _actual_ _ly go for each other, even though they're better friends than most of the boys would_ _ever_ _think, but it was such a pretty image. And of course in my fantasies Hermione and I promised Parvati_ _in the morning_ _that we'd find a way to bring Harry up_ _to stay with us the next evening_ _, and it turned out that the stairs wouldn't stop a boy at all when two girls were holding his hands,_ _because the Founders were careful, not prudish or paranoid._

Ginny felt a bit ashamed at the sexual daydreams of her Third and Fourth Years being so exposed, but the gentle, wordless, loving reassurance from her wives and husband drove the shame away in a heartbeat. “Um, sometimes... But mostly I would stop looking at the pictures, close my eyes, and start fantasising when I was really well into my, err, session of masturbation, because thinking about the people I loved and wanted was what really got me hot and wet and made me come. Imagining it was your fingers, or Hermione's, or Luna's, not mine...” He trailed his fingers lower. “Yes, like that, love. Oh!” He was touching the lips of her vulva, tracing them, coming close to her clitoris, then moving away... “Oh, my Harry! Ooooooh! I love you!”

“I love you, Ginny. If you want...”

“No, love, I can wait for my orgasm, just like our Hermione. It's our Luna's turn to be stripped bare, my darling husband.”

He kissed her again, and she snuggled against him, enjoying the warmth and the solidity of him. He was hers. He was really hers. And Hermione's, and Luna's, but that was fine because Hermione and Luna were hers as well. _I really am nude in Harry Potter's arms,_ _and those really are his fingers between my thighs_ _. I'm not dreaming._ _I'm not a silly little girl lying in bed alone and pretending that the handsome Boy Who Lived_ _and his beautiful best friend_ _and my own sweet best friend_ _are making love to me at last_ _._ _We're married, and it's real._ She reached down and gently squeezed her husband's still-clothed arse. “Come, my love, time to take our Luna's clothes off. She's amazingly pretty, so I'm sure you'll enjoy seeing her body without any annoying fabric in the way, and she's also a confirmed nudist so she'll be amazingly grateful to you for making her more comfortable.”

“I'd be immensely grateful to our husband in any case, Ginevra, for taking off Hermione's and your clothes with such lovely style and verve and so on, not to mention for making you both wriggle so adorably, but yes, I am very much looking forward to having him undress me.”

“As you wish, my loves.” He released her. His hand lingered on her sex for a moment longer, and then he brought it away. She felt as if he'd left some subtle trace on her skin, and she was glad of it.

Just as he'd done with Hermione, he licked his fingers. It made her feel warm inside, not just aroused, but loved and treasured. “You taste brilliant, Ginny.”

“Mm, thanks. Do you think you could tell me apart from our wives by flavour alone?”

“I think I'll have to do a complete study first. Tasting each of you at least once a day for, oh, the rest of our lives should be adequate, I reckon. Is that good science, Hermione?”

The brunette giggled. “I'm not sure that experiment counts as an orthodox application of the scientific method, Harry, but it sounds like fun and I look forward to participating. In any case, bring those wet fingers of yours over here. Luna and I want to try our Ginny's honey for ourselves.” It was shockingly erotic to watch their wives sharing Harry's hand between the two of them, tasting her juices.

She hugged Harry from the side as Hermione and Luna were licking his fingers clean, straddling his leg so he could feel the heat of her. She wrapped her arms about him, and she couldn't resist letting one hand drift down to caress the bulge under his own trousers. “How's that, love?”

“Mm... Trying not to think about it. Don't want to spurt in my underpants. That would be messy. And pointless.”

“Are you sure? It would be such a nice mess...”

“I'd rather... use it where it could do more good, love. I've three of you to satisfy, after all. I'll do all I can with my fingers and tongue and lips, of course, but I don't want any of my wives to think for an instant that she's not as worthy of, well, the full marital act.”

“Oh, all riiiight.” Her sister wives' hands joined her own in teasing Harry's erection, their fingers twining together for an instant before they withdrew. “Till later, love,” Ginny whispered in his ear. “But once our Luna's naked, your girls are going to have their fun with you.”

Luna and Hermione embraced them. “Yes, we will,” Hermione said. “And I think you'll be surprised at just how much stamina you'll actually have, my Harry. I don't believe you need have any fears of not being able to service all three of us, my husband. Not even if we have a bit of fun with our own hands and lips on your lovely member before the main event. And I hope we will, because I'd like to make up for at least a few of the times at school when I didn't pull you or our wives into a broom cupboard for a bit of the traditional innocent adolescent exploration.”

Harry smiled, rather wistfully. “I'd like to make up for some of that, myself. Intercourse was kind of intimidating to think about, but I've been curious about fingering and kissing down there ever since I learnt it was possible. No need to worry about coming too soon, no stupid Quidditch scores to recite in my head, just making my girls feel good.”

Hermione grinned. “I'm sure you'll have no problems on that front, my Harry. I don't think any of us will.”

Luna nibbled Hermione's ear. “Even aside from the fact that we girls are well able to do all sorts of nice orgasm-inducing things for each other, magic has a way of expanding a Wizard's capacity to match that of his Witches. The only downside, I'm given to understand, is that we might every so often, probably no more than four episodes yearly, round about the cross-quarter days, find that we need to make love five or six times in a single day.”

Ginny giggled. “That's a downside?”

“Well, it could make for awkwardness in terms of scheduling things, I suppose. I'm not easily embarrassed, but even I might find it slightly uncomfortable to beg off from a family wedding or a May Day celebration because we were spending the whole day in bed.”

“I'll do all I can,” Harry said, “but I'm not sure I could manage to do much more than watch towards the end. Even if I could, well, ejaculate fifteen or eighteen times in twenty-four hours, I'd be worried about, err, rubbing all the skin off. And wouldn't that be hard on the three of you as well?”

“There are potions which would take care of the chafing issue for all of us,” Hermione said. “I've read about them. Purely out of abstract scholarly curiosity, of course.”

“Of course, love.” Harry reached down and squeezed Hermione's bottom, and she purred and rubbed against him.

“I suppose it wouldn't hurt to have a few doses of those brewed and tucked away under stasis, just in case,” Luna said, “but I don't believe we'll need them. The marriage bond gives a Wizard, and Witches, all the capacity they need to take care of each other. We don't hear of it so much, since three-person marriages are unusual today and those of four or more are very rare indeed, but I've a copy of the book my maternal ancestor Alasdair Ac Donncha and his wives wrote about their life together. He and his fiancée, Lasairfhíona Nic an Ghoill, were trading round the magical ports of North Africa as captain and first mate of one of his family's ships when they rescued two Veela and an Irish mermaid from the harem of the Bey of Algiers with the help of the Bey's recently wed wife, a gorgeous and well-educated granddaughter of Suleiman the Magnificent who didn't in the least mind her husband having concubines but wouldn't stand for him mistreating them and was more than capable of expressing her feelings on the matter with several good blows of a yataghan to his torso and neck. The six of them married the day after they arrived back home in Donegal, since of course they couldn't leave a poor self-made widow from distant Constantinople all by herself in a country where hardly anybody spoke Turkish, Arabic, Persian, or even Sabir.”

“Could I read that book sometime, darling?” Hermione murmured.

“Of course, sweet. I'm very curious to discover if our bond extends to the point of sharing our languages with each other or if you'll need to take a lozenge for Irish. But first Harry needs to take my clothes off, and then I think we girls should probably take his clothes off. And then all of us can spend some time gaining first-hand knowledge of orgasms in the context of a four-partner marriage, which will, of course, only improve our ability to understand such things from a scholarly perspective.”

“Mm... First sex, and then books? What could be better?” Hermione mimed cracking a whip. “Hurry up, my Harry! It's time to strip our lovely, luscious, and loveable Luna.”

 

#

 

“Would you be so kind as to start with my boots, please?” Luna said. She wasn't sure why she did, but it sounded nice, somehow. _Being naked completely sounds even nicer, of course, but I would like to_ _be barefoot_ _right away_ _. Working my toes in the carpet, twining them with Harry's own toes..._ _Well, that will have to wait until he's got his own shoes off, won't it?_ _Sometimes I wish we were_ _all_ _Hobbits, so we wouldn't need shoes._ _Then again_ _,_ _t_ _he Third Age is long since past, and the Fourth Age as well, and they seem to be in hiding now it's the Seventh. I_ _t was_ _really rather_ _nice to go to Hogwarts with Harry and Hermione and Ginevra,_ _and I don't believe there's any evidence of a Hobbit equivalent,_ _so I reckon i_ _t's probably just as well_ _we're Men—or, more_ _precis_ _ely, Man and Women—instead_ _._ _Second breakfast and furry feet are all well and good, but_ _I_ _expect_ _if we were Hobbit_ _s there would be times when I_ _would_ _wish I were taller_ _._

“As you wish, my Luna.” He knelt at her feet and helped her to get her boots off. Luna glanced over at Hermione and Ginevra. Their beautiful wives, both nude now, stood cuddled together, watching. Hermione was softly cupping Ginevra's breasts, with pauses to rub her belly, down to her lovely red pubic bush and up again, not so much to stimulate her sexually, Luna could tell, as simply to enjoy the smaller girl's softness and warmth. Ginevra was almost purring, rubbing her bottom against Hermione, much as Hermione herself had done when she sat in Harry's lap.

_I love them all so much,_ Luna thought to herself, and she felt a wave of love from her wives and husband washing over her in reply. Harry  held her boots in place as she pulled her feet free, and when that was done he put them aside and began rubbing her toes,  just as he'd done for their wives . It felt delightful. More than that, it felt right. She wondered how the four of them had managed to go through  five years at Hogwarts without falling into a relationship  much earlier .  _Well, it doesn't matter. We're together now, we're married, and before we sleep tonight we'll have given each other our virginity and He Whom Nobody Likes To Name will be defeated. I'm sure I cannot think of a better ending for such a nasty and hateful person as Tom Riddle._

“My loves,” Ginevra said, “would it be all right if we took a minute to take Harry's shoes off?”

He paused in his rubbing to look up at her. “You don't have to, sweet. Doesn't our Luna need to be naked?”

Luna reached down and stroked his hair. “I do, of course, but it might be nice to be able to grasp your toes in mine as you finish taking my clothes off. And now that I think about it, isn't it really rather funny that you're down there and I'm petting you, when as a general rule I'd prefer to be the submissive partner in our relationship, at least when it comes to sex, as opposed to things like household decisions where it's appropriate for us to act as equals? Not that I necessarily _mind_ , but it does seem slightly odd.”

He grinned up at her, and reached up under her shirt to tickle her belly. “Well, then, I'll just have to dominate you, won't I? Would you like that, my pretty little pet Luna?”

“Rarr! I'm a fierce wild Luna. Tame me, my Master!” Both of them laughed like silly children as he pulled her down to the floor where she longed to be, and she pretended to struggle as he pretended to pin her to the carpet. But there was no pretending at all when Harry unbuttoned her shirt and pushed it back off her shoulders. She was a little bit worried that they'd broken protocol, since Ginevra and Hermione had been standing when Harry took their tops off, but she could feel their wives' approval.

“No bra, my sweet Luna?” He trailed his fingers up and down her sides, making her giggle and squirm.

“No—oh!—great need for one, my love. Not with these tiny breasts of mine. They're kind of like little half-lemons, I've always thought. Well, at least since I've had them I've thought that. I do have to admit they were more like little dried-apricot bumps when Ginevra and I were Sorted.”

“They're beautiful little half-lemons. And I can tell that Hermione and Ginny think they're beautiful as well.”

It was true. She could feel it. Her wives and husband hadn't just talked themselves into liking her body because they loved her, they truly thought she was beautiful. Luna didn't know whether to cry or laugh or simply hold them all tight and never ever let them go. Well, maybe not _never_ , since they would need to have a pee eventually and she rather suspected that all three of the others, in spite of how comfortable they were becoming with nudity, would still want a modicum of privacy for that. _Particularly Harry, I'd think._

He smiled that funny little half smile that Luna had loved ever since the first moment she saw it, years before she dared to hope that he'd be hers and Ginevra's as well as Hermione's. “Yes, love. I'm afraid I'm rather boring that way.”

“It's quite all right, my Harry. Since we're grown up, there are all sorts of things you can do with your penis that are far more interesting than passing water. And something makes me think you'll not mind my watching you do _those_ at all, will you?”

“Hmm, I suppose not, my Luna. Especially when you're helping me with them.” His hands were still playing along her sides, up into her armpits—having her oxters strokedfelt far nicer than Luna would have imagined, and there was something stunningly endearing about the way Harry gently tugged at the little golden curls that grew there—and back down to her waistband.

It was lovely to be touched like that, but she was really looking forward to her husband handling other parts of her body. She drew her shoulders back and thrust her breasts forward. “Look at my nipples, love. Look at how perky they are. They're doing that for you. And for our Hermione and our Ginevra as well, of course.”

He tickled her belly and brought his hands upwards to her breasts. Slowly, reverently, he caressed them all over, avoiding the nipples until finally, at her silent mental prompting, he gave each a gentle little tweak between his thumb and forefinger.

“Oh! My Harry! Oh!” Luna came very close to orgasm. _Oh my goodness gracious!_ _I_ _'d read that_ _it was theoretically possible to make a woman come, given sufficient arousal on her part, without stimulating her clitoris_ _or her G-spot_ _, but that was... well, we're going to have to experiment in the future._ _Touching_ _down there feels so_ _good_ _when I do it myself_ _, and I'm_ _so very much looking forward to having my wives and my husband do it, and to doing it to them. I'm_ _not sure I'd want to go without_ _that touching_ _very often even if I could have an orgasm by other means, but.... well, that_ _wa_ _s awfully_ _pleasurable_ _._

Hermione giggled. “It's nice to know somebody else in the family is equally capable of getting caught up in theory when she ought to be too busy with practice. But in this case, I think our cute little blonde wife needs a little more stimulation, don't you, my dearest Ginny?”

“I'm your only Ginny, aren't I? The last time I checked, neither Harry nor Luna was a Ginny, although I suppose it's possible one of them has a secret middle name that they've never told me.” The redhead reached up and poked Hermione in the nose. “Meep!”

Hermione tickled Ginevra's belly. “Silly thing! But come now, tickle our Luna's feet, my darling, and I'll get our Harry's boots off, how's that?”

“Yes, Mistress.” Ginevra knelt down, which made her breasts move in a very interesting and delightful manner, and did as Hermione commanded. It was very far from the first time Ginevra had tickled Luna—they'd had a lovely tickle-fight and wrestling match on the first day they met, just as soon as they were able to escape from the adults and go running through the fields to the little wood that separated the Lovegood and Weasley properties, They might have been scolded for dirtying their dresses if Luna's grandparents' House Elf Moxie, who'd stayed at the Tower for a few more days before joining her master and mistress in Tenerife, in order to make sure the younger generation knew how to take proper care of the place, hadn't cleaned them off and retrieved their shoes and socks from the mud before their parents could see. But there was something very nice about Ginevra tickling her as her wife, rather than simply as her friend, and having their husband tickling her belly and underarms and breasts was a rather nice addition as well.

_If I'd worn a skirt and nothing underneath, as I usually would have done, it would probably come off as I was squirming here, and then we three naked girls could roll Harry on his back and take his clothes off, an act of boldness which would give him a perfect excuse to put each of us over his knee for a gentle mock-spanking afterwards. But it was awfully nice to have Harry display Ginevra and Hermione. I'd like to be treated the same way. Goodness, I think I'm almost starting to appreciate trousers and knickers. Isn't that marvellously odd?_

Hermione had made short work of Harry's footwear, and Luna was very much enjoying the feel of his pleasure as their wife rubbed at his bare feet, especially when she planted a little kiss right on his left arch. “I hope that doesn't smell too foul, love,” he said. “My feet must kind of stink.”

She blew a raspberry on his other foot. “Only a little bit, and it's a nice stink, my love. It's yours.”

He giggled. It was nice to hear a sound like that from her husband. Hermione's giggling was a delightful surprise already, a further sign of just how much their darling wife trusted all of them, since she'd never allowed herself to giggle at Hogwarts, at least not in Luna's hearing, except for one time the year before, back when Professor Dumbledore was still alive, before the Ministry and the school fell into the hands of the Dark Lord's puppets, when she and Luna were alone in the Library and Luna made a joke about Professor Binns that caught her by surprise. _I was so surprised_ _myself_ _, and so pleased. It was the first time I ever dared to think that, just maybe, Ginevra and I might_ _truly_ _get our wish and have both Harry Potter and his beautiful best friend._

“I remember that, love,” Hermione whispered. She'd crawled closer, so she could plant a little kiss on Harry's lips and rub Luna's belly. “It was just a few minutes after you convinced me to stop being stupid and worrying about the annotations in Harry's second-hand Potions book, and I felt such a sense of relief that I was almost giddy with it. If Madam Pince hadn't come by our table to tell us we should go to dinner, who knows what might have happened? I might have been giddy enough to kiss you.”

“And I would have kissed you back, but then I would have told you that I couldn't kiss you very much more until we had a talk with Harry and Ginevra.”

Hermione looked far away for a moment. “Which would have been appropriate, of course. Do you think we could have, well, got together back then?”

Luna clasped her hand. “All sorts of things are possible, Hermione. Your parents could have met Harry's when you were both tiny children, in a world where Muggles had never entirely lost the custom of childhood betrothals, and then they could have talked to my parents and Ginevra's, and the four of us could have grown up engaged, something like Neville and Hannah. In some other different world, you could have been put to bed with Harry on the night of your Sorting, or after he saved you from the troll.”

“Or I could have kissed him right there in the lavatory, and who knows what might have happened?”

Ginevra laughed. “Well, my brother would probably have clawed his eyes out on the spot from sheer horror, and Madam Pomfrey would have had to give him several nasty potions to grow them back. I don't know if I would have laughed or felt sorry for him when I heard about it, but I probably would have been kind of sad about Harry Potter being taken, at least up until Luna and I met you and found out we could fancy you just as much as we fancied Harry, and vice versa. And in any case, the four of us are together now, and we're married, which is what counts.”

Luna concentrated her thoughts on Ginevra's pretty red bush, and the tender and pretty parts beneath, which she had of course seen in the past but which she had never before had the chance to touch or to inspect with anything like the proper thoroughness and close-range attention to detail which they deserved, trying her best to send a little pulse right _there_. Her favourite ginger's toes curled and her smile went slightly and adorably sillier for a moment, so it must have worked, at least a little bit. “That's a good point, sweet Ginevra. And I'm still half-dressed, which I do think is slightly unfair, my darlings. We seem to have this rather pleasant and arousing ritual of Harry standing us up and displaying us to each other in states of partial and complete nudity, and it seems a terrible pity to mess with success, doesn't it?”

“It does,” Hermione said. “Let's get up, my darlings. Our Luna deserves her chance to shine. Well, she'd shine anywhere, but her chance to stand up and shine as she's inspected by the two of us whilst our Harry moves her about and takes the last two pieces of her clothes off, how's that?”

“It's just fine, darling. More than that, it's perfect.”

“Yes, it is,” Harry said. They helped each other to their feet, and the girls all hugged their husband and each other for a long moment. It felt terribly nice to feel the slight roughness of Harry's cotton shirt against her belly and her nipples, and to feel her wives' skin against her own as well. And of course Luna took the opportunity to have a good feel of Ginevra's and Hermione's bare bottoms.

A few moments later, and she was in Harry's arms again, hers around him, kissing his lips as his hands roved over her back and drifted round to her waist. He unbuttoned her trousers and let them slide down to her ankles. She giggled and clung to him, and he supported her whole weight as she pulled both feet out at once and kicked the garment away. She was almost completely bare in his arms now, and she couldn't resist straddling his leg so he could feel the heat between her thighs. “Mm, you feel good, my Luna-love,” he said, cupping her bottom with one hand. _That feels so nice even with_ _a layer of cotton knit_ _between his skin and mine. How wonderful will it feel when I'm nude?_ “You're very warm.”

She wanted to kiss him again, and therefore she did. _It's our wedding night, and I reckon that's my right._ After a sweet and thorough kissing, she carried on with the verbal part of their conversation. “I think I'd be more precisely described as hot, my dearest husband, not to mention soaking wet, although I suppose your perception is shaded by the fact that there's a pair of knickers, your own trousers, and doubtless your underpants as well separating my vulva from your body. I'd ask you to simply rip the knickers off me, as I'm certain our dear friend and family member Winky would be more than happy to repair them before I return them to our Ginevra, but I believe you're meant to display me to our wives first, rather as if they were judges at a unique sort of beauty pageant where the girls were displayed like cute ponies being shown in a halter class and you were my handler. I suppose technically speaking such a show would make far more sense if the girls were displayed naked, since the nethers are one of the prettiest parts of a girl and it would be a terrible pity not to take them into account when evaluating her beauty, but it's not as if you'll not do the same again when I'm nude. And we do seem to have this custom we've established, don't we?”

“Yes, we do,” Hermione said. “Show us our lovely Luna, Harry.”

Luna wriggled against him, and they let each other go. She was pleased to see she'd indeed left a bit of a wet spot on his hip, even through her knickers. _Then again, I expect he'll need his trousers cleaned_ _before he wears them again_ _,_ _just as_ _we_ _three_ _girls_ _will_ _want ours cleaned_ _. Goodness, this is delightfully erotic._

He kept his hand on her shoulder, which felt delicious, like something out of the fantasies she'd been weaving in her head since before the first vague stirrings of lust in her body, fantasies where the Boy Who Lived came to find her and Ginevra and told them that he'd been dreaming of a tender little blonde and a sweet cuddly redhead and he was claiming them under the Old Laws, since he'd saved their lives by defeating Voldemort and in any case they were far too pretty to remain free in Ottery St. Catchpole when they could be his instead. “Look, my loves,” he said, “here's our Luna. What do you think?” He turned her about, petting her softly on the bottom as he did.

“A lovely specimen, wouldn't you agree, my sweet little Ginny?” Hermione was petting Ginevra, her hand getting closer and closer to the red-head's most intimate parts.

Ginevra grinned. “Well, if I were buying her in a slave market I'd tell Harry to pull those knickers off before I made my decision, but I'd know perfectly well in my heart that she was worth any price, so it would just be for the excuse to see her pretty quim as soon as possible and maybe to touch her and make her squirm even before I paid up. And if I were a judge, twelve out of ten would be the very minimum score.”

“Slave markets are usually a little too scary for my fantasies,” Hermione murmured, “since I don't like even the merest hint of the possibility of us being bought by someone other than our Harry, or of our Luna and our Ginny belonging to anyone other than to Harry and me, but a show does sound rather nice, at least in fantasy, as long as all the other handlers and judges, besides our Harry, were girls.“

“That does sound ideal,” Ginevra said, “although I suppose it might be kind of sexist. Perhaps our husband should spank us for it? Please?”

“Actually,” Harry said, “I agree with Hermione. If I have to share the sight of my wives with someone, even in a fantasy, I'd rather it were only with other women.”

Ginevra pretended to pout, which was adorable. _Then again, everything my spice do is adorable, in my experience._ “Oh, I agree as well. But I do hope you've still got some excuse for giving each of us a dozen strokes on the bare bottom with something soft. Haven't you, my husband? Please?”

“Oh, I'm sure he'll think of something, my silly little girl!” Hermione tickled Ginevra between her legs, and the sweet ginger gasped and squealed.

Luna felt the echo of Ginevra's pleasure and threw her head back. “Oh, loves, that feels wonderful. Please, Harry, my dearest darling husband, it's long past time I were completely bare, just as our wives are.”

He hugged her again and ran his fingers through her hair. The pleasure was almost painful. She wriggled against him. His fingers trailed down her back, down to her waist, and he slipped them into her knickers. She made a helpless little mewing sound, and mentally begged him not to take too long.

“As you wish, my darling Luna,” he whispered, and pushed her knickers down almost to her knees in one smooth motion. It was the work of a moment for her to slip free of them, and then she was completely nude— _but for my wedding ring and t_ _he Dirigible Plums_ _hanging from_ _my ear_ _lobes_ _, which I_ _should hope_ _don't count_ —in his arms, her mouth on his, kissing him and being kissed. As they explored each others' mouths, he caressed her left ankle bone with his right big toe, and tenderly traced his way along the top of her foot until he'd grasped her big toe in his, just as she'd been hoping he'd do. Ginevra and Hermione were kissing as well, and teasing each other with careful little touches.

They kissed for a few wonderful minutes that felt like forever. When they paused, she laid her head on his chest. “Time to show me off to our loves, my Harry.”

He rubbed her bottom. Being stroked there did feel even better now that it was bare. “As you wish, my Luna.”

He took a moment to smooth her hair, combing it with his fingers, moving it off her shoulders and letting it trail down her back. And then he posed her before their wives. “Look, my darlings, isn't this a pretty girl we've married?”

“Oh, good heavens, yes,” Hermione said. “Just look at her. Those sweet hips, those darling little breasts, her wonderful mane which I'm looking forward to combing and plaiting and tangling my fingers in amongst, that gorgeous patch of gold between her legs with the pink promise of her petals beneath... However did you manage to bathe completely nude with this blonde beauty, my dearest Ginny, without giving into the overwhelming temptation to kiss those rosy nipples and finger that beautiful cleft? For that matter, dearest Luna, how did you stop yourself tasting this red-headed beauty's sweat and finding out for yourself how soft and wet she is between these lovely thighs?” Hermione caressed Ginevra's bottom with one hand and cupped a freckled breast in the other.

Ginevra wriggled happily.“Well, love, all I can say is that we were waiting for you and our Harry.”

Luna nodded. “That's the only adequate hypothesis I've managed to develop, my loves. For that matter, waiting for Ginevra and myself is the only reasonable explanation for why yourself and Harry didn't become boyfriend and girlfriend by your Fourth Year, if not your Third, and fully bonded lovers before Christmas holidays in your Sixth at the very latest.”

“I suppose you're right, my clever golden love. I'd mourn for the time we all lost, but I'd rather look ahead to our future,” Hermione said. “Now turn her about, my Harry, and let's see her bottom.”

He petted her softly on the hip as he turned her. That was pleasant, but what was even better was Ginevra's murmured “Oh, my goodness, how wonderful. I'm afraid I've never before dared to look as closely at your body as I should have done, Luna. That's a beautiful little birthmark on your left cheek.” Both her wives fingered the spot in turn, which made Luna gasp, because it felt almost as good as if they'd touched her sex. She hadn't expected that at all.

“I'm sorry I didn't know you were stopping yourself looking, sweet Ginevra. I certainly didn't hesitate to count the freckles on your rump and below your navel, even if I never touched them. I'd have told you it was fine to look, if only I'd noticed. I wish I had done, my darling.”

Ginevra patted her softly on the hip. “It's all right, love.”

Hermione patted her other hip. “You can't notice everything, sweet Luna. After all, Harry and I went six years and more not noticing we were in love with each other, or at least pretending we hadn't noticed.”

Harry turned her round again, and Luna's whole body tingled with anticipation, because she knew it was time for him to touch her most intimate parts. _Most intimate except for my heart, in any case, and he touched that years ago, when I saw him with his sweet Hermione and I knew that they loved each other as truly as anyone in Hogwarts, even if they were telling themselves they were only children and only friends._ _I fell in love with them both at that moment, even though I didn't dare to hope that they'd ever_ _take the time to_ _talk to a mad blonde_ _Ravenclaw_ _girl from Devon_ _shire_ _who saw things others couldn't_ _and spent her nights fantasising about the three most fascinating and wonderful people in Gryffindor_ _, let alone that their hearts could be so big that they'd love me and Ginevra as well_ _._

Very gently, he reached out and laid his fore and middle fingertips on her lips. She kissed them, and he traced his way slowly down her chin, down her throat, down between her breasts, down to her navel, and slowly, tenderly, down her abdomen to her mound and then to her labia.

“Oooh, Haaarrryyy... That... that is the very most—oh!—pleasant sensation I've ever felt, my lovely, loving, and beloved husband.”

“You're very wet, my sweet Luna.” Their eyes were locked on each other, and if it hadn't been for the loving presence of their wives Luna might have felt as if they were alone in a little pocket universe, just her and Harry. _I'm glad we're not. We need them just as much as they need us._ His fingertip was moving softly, gently, exploring her folds. He wasn't trying to give her an orgasm, or even to make her more aroused than she already was. That was for later. Instead, he was investigating her body, with more than a trace of the same innocent curiosity she remembered feeling as a child when she wandered through the Rollright Stones, spying out the lines of sight connecting the megaliths with the rest of the landscape and the ley lines tying them in with the magical currents of the entire island. _Good heavens, I hadn't thought I could feel any more loved than I already felt. Sometimes it's good to have one's hypothesis falsified._

“Yes, I am. It's because of you and our wives, you know.” She moved closer, put her arms about him, and kissed him on the lips. His free arm slid about her back. “I love you, Harry Potter. Thank you for claiming me as well as marrying me, or should I reverse that? In any case, I think now you should have your taste of my lubricant, and give our Ginevra and our Hermione theirs, and then it will be time for us to have a proper look at _your_ intimate parts.”

He grinned. “As you wish, Luna Potter.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter is where the girls return the favour and they carry out the ritual. Not sure if I'll be able to get the consummation in as well, or if that will need another chapter.
> 
> I've had this written for months, and realised it was high time I posted it. Thanks so much for reading!


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